Come Spirit

Come September, come harvest,
come Fall,
come bright October
when light lies over the land
festooned in a wealth
of color.

Then come November,
when wind turns the landscape dark.
Trees lose their leaves,
leaving geese
to revel like thieves
in cornfields already picked over.

I rejoice at heart just to hear it:
noisy wind, loud geese;
everything hurly-burley.
Nothing else comes near it,
at least,
unless there's a circus at hand.

Then come December
when snow and ice
clog the land.
Otherwise, only hiss of snow,
the rustle of leaves left on oaks
and the noise of crows.

Silence now is the spirit of things,
crows the season's mascots.
Short mornings, long evenings.
clouds of breath,
You can't ignore it.

Then comes again raucous Spring