Come softly
silver rain, come
softly now my thoughts,
heavy as October's reddest hue
in hours shed these patched conceits
of dry leaves, curled
along the Summer road,
become some vast appalling wilderness...

Your hands, an Autumn dream,
cast a thick red sap
upon the swollen planes of my body,
crouch in a stealth pathos
of grey leopard cells,
as they well, wild with faith
and thirsty prayer...

Come away
from these stale Summer breads,
for your kisses
are a much softer fate
than wisdom, come
the ease of rain, softly
silver rain...

Stay the solemn night
with leaves, bedeck
my perilous flesh,
let it ascend
its grey latitudes
in blizzards of dogwood,
kindling songs on paperchains...

My hands,
string an alphabet
of silence, tied
by hours of rope,
inviolate, palms
clasped to glass, two
hummingbirds, quiet...

Stilled, joined, unbind
to close into fists, come Autumn
the season of bearing,
the rich red earth darkens and drinks
our tears, and now, never
the ease of rain, falling,
come softly,
softly silver rain....