Gone are the lights of the fireflies
ground up and sprinkled in outstretched hair.
Gone is the smolder of fallen timber piled
in celebration, smoking in the glow of autumn.
The musty scents of rotting logs draw words
out of mud pits bubbling beneath barren limbs
and the soft songs of crows pour like liquid,
the land giving rise to falling apart,
to dilapidated fence posts flecked
in white peels and splintered deep browns
moist with purple mist, purple ants dripping
down the remnants of structure, paths
forking in clearings, clearings opening
into nothingness behind windowpanes
shut to the yard below, encircled by fading
pines chalked and marked for felling.