the last day of september.

the unusual gift of rain and cool breezes
has been given to me this morning
to ease the burden of autumn's absence:

the slow turning of seasons,
the transformation of leaves into patchwork landscapes,
the way the air becomes as crisp as the golden grasses underfoot.

how i always dread the coming of this season
when i am overseas-
little can be done to remedy the longing for all that october is:

searching for apples in the orchard,
lazy walks home from school through maple forests, shuffling through dried, decaying leaves,
climbing that old worn down mountain that i swear belongs to my grandmother, in her infinite wisdom,
hiding in leaf piles my father so carefully raked,
the shock of that first frosty morning: nose cold, fingers stiff, frost shimmering on gold, red and still-green leaves.

there is nothing that can be done about these things,
nor perhaps should there be.
they need to stay where they are, to live as they have, in memory and in time.

i am here, in the tropics.
knees sweating,
summer coming.