By Pavel Chichikov
The hawkweed and the teasel set out their autumn scrolls
The first a green umbrella-stand with folded parasols
But grey unfriendly teasel was a tower filled with spikes
Indifferent to a troubador or what his lady likes
Killdeer in their dickeys wore their slightly soiled white collars
Hunted down the locusts but ignored abandoned dollars
Sumac turning crimson saw the last of Queen Anne's lace
A daisy losing florets raised her autumn-blackened face
Now I see the cumuli intending to be funny
Pretending to be thunderheads although the sky is sunny
The wind is doing handsprings though it has no hand or foot
Flesh or bone or moisture or a bellyful of soot
Indifferent to the messengers, insensitive to scorn
The crimson of the sumac, the yellow of the corn
A parallel of universes, thinking it not so
The metaphoric autumn is the only one we know
How to be the hawkweed, the teasel or the daisy
The killdeer, the sumac, the goldenrod gone lazy
Never by the symbol – never by the sign
Only by the Holy Spirit: body of the mind
(Click here to follow Pavel's ongoing epic poem “The Shoulder of the Sun.” You may visit Pavel's website at http://www.greyowlpress.com.)
