Skittish, it runs past
to be with her family,
deer in September.

Mixed with the shadows
on the path in September,
there’s us and the deer.

Orion fades out
as early daybreak seeps in,
we move under it.

The look that he gives
on walks, in forests, green grass
that says contentment.

Fine silver hairgrass
on our path to the river,
memory follows.

Golden feather grass
takes its turn in between
times of warmth and change.

Today I saw a
luna moth and cormorants,
wings shaking, outstretched.

Lost on the water,
in dreams, beach that isn’t beach,
boats that aren’t boats.

The world of others
is a comfort and burden —
the goodnights, goodbyes.

Late summer roses,
I didn’t think I’d be fooled
again and again.

The sky telling me
that September is coming,
I must change again.

The moon, not super,
not blue, no lady in it,
just hung low, silent.

Crickets sing all day
in this drifting August time,
before and after.

I can’t let it go,
my want of something precious,
something beloved.

Light catches the tips
of long summer cattail leaves
like lines drawn in ink.

Under the blue moon,
on the warm swaying cattail,
the grasshopper sleeps.

Alone, I’m walking,
as the river current goes,
and things fall apart.

Calm late summer light,
the morning of a blue moon,
rose about to bloom.

Maybe this is me
with precise, beautiful wings,
in another life.

It’s easy to think
the sunflower is like me,
head up, still forlorn.