Last Saturday morning I was working in my summer journal. When I came to the last page in the book I realized it is time to start a new one. I have been fooling myself that it is still summer, probably because it has been so wet and green here in Virginia. Last week we picked beautiful Asian pears at a local farm and the stalks of my okra have fallen over in the wind. When I harvested my measly sweet potatoes I had to cut off large branches of marigolds that had grown through my protective fencing. The late yellow and orange petals are radiant, perfect in the September dew.
To the Light of September
When you are already here
you appear to be only
a name that tells of you
whether you are present or not
and for now it seems as though
you are still summer
still the high familiar
endless summer
yet with a glint
of bronze in the chill mornings
and the late yellow petals
of the mullein fluttering
on the stalks that lean
over their broken
shadows across the cracked ground
but they all know
that you have come
the seed heads of the sage
the whispering birds
with nowhere to hide you
to keep you for later
you
who fly with them
you who are neither
before nor after
you who arrive
with blue plums
that have fallen through the night
perfect in the dew
you appear to be only
a name that tells of you
whether you are present or not
and for now it seems as though
you are still summer
still the high familiar
endless summer
yet with a glint
of bronze in the chill mornings
and the late yellow petals
of the mullein fluttering
on the stalks that lean
over their broken
shadows across the cracked ground
but they all know
that you have come
the seed heads of the sage
the whispering birds
with nowhere to hide you
to keep you for later
you
who fly with them
you who are neither
before nor after
you who arrive
with blue plums
that have fallen through the night
perfect in the dew
By W. S. Merwin
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