Fenced-in sunflowers,
stumbling over each other—
first October day.

Broke open by him,
Wendell Berry, his windows,
seeing peace through them.

An apparition,
I still recognize her face—
hair tied at the neck.

I’m gathering strength,
made out of sand and driftwood,
roaring all night long.

Saving my nature
from the dark given-up days
for this pure moment.

Clouds fall in the lake—
a poem read like a spell
takes me to its edge.

Darkness comes on quick,
the woods in mid-September,
crickets sing all day.

These small needful things
under the September moon,
summer still singing.

Soft moss on the trees,
goldenrod haze shapes the light—
it’s open-hearted.

Waking from a dream,
where you were you but not you—
I'm me all along.

Imagined mountains,
greened with trees and lit by sun,
shadows come out blue.

September portrait—
ideas dance around me,
clouds inside my head.

My shadow moving,
the moon over the meadow,
grasses filled with song.

Spinning under sun—
light on September asters
and me and my dog.

The luck in the sky—
unraveling with blue light,
breaking with the day.

Everything unnamed—
not a week, or day, or hour,
this is not Venus.

Crickets at their peak—
the making and unmaking
of the summer sky.

Blooming on a log
just off the path we walk,
among ferns and sunlight.

Seven sweet pea seeds
took their time to sprout and bloom
on soft, spiny vines.

Shaking words around,
trying to write a poem,
blue jays call in clouds.