Autumn

The part of life

devoted to contemplation

was at odds with the part

committed to action.

*

Fall was approaching.

But I remember

it was always approaching

once school ended.

*

Life, my sister said,

is like a torch passed now

from the body to the mind.

Sadly, she went on, the mind is not

there to receive it.

The sun was setting.

Ah, the torch, she said.

It has gone out, I believe.

Our best hope is that it’s flickering,

fort/da, fort/da, like little Ernst

throwing his toy over the side of his crib

and then pulling it back. It’s too bad,

she said, there are no children here.

We could learn from them, as Freud did.

*

We would sometimes sit

on benches outside the dining room.

The smell of leaves burning.

Old people and fire, she said.

Not a good thing. They burn their houses down.

*

How heavy my mind is,

filled with the past.

Is there enough room

for the world to penetrate?

It must go somewhere,

it cannot simply sit on the surface—

*

Stars gleaming over the water.

The leaves piled, waiting to be lit.

*

Insight, my sister said.

Now it is here.

But hard to see in the darkness.

You must find your footing

before you put your weight on it.