Two Poems by Rodney Nelson
Day Fall
for seaj
it would happen in the afternoon’s aging
with sun on the wall and no movement
an abrupt yet intricate modulation
of temperature humidity and light
a resettling down in the air too quick to
catch ahead of its effect on the garden
nicotiana with a richer smell now
and more impendent gold in the one stray cloud
I would have been alone with me and good at
day fall but in vacancy the next minute
the mere wooden bench at the wall not the same
where an other had waited to turn and look
the aging of afternoon would make it my
own again and refix me in solitude
a way to hold onto the rest of my time
and the evening come out not down or yet
Fall Omen
a day after the hunting moon you went
to find an omen that remained of it
and did not watch the women bead and quill
with bone hairpipe and stitch and out in the
hills were river and lake in too-late flood
the hanging leaves on them too evident
whatever the fade of red or yellow
or of midday light and even the too-
rich grasses were maintained in a wait for
an autumn wind to make them weathercock
in the mud and mist of a trail you would
have sung to the averting or delay
but it led to an open drumlin height
and change in view and sky and the wait’s end
and that was all the moon had omened of
Photo credit: jenny downing (flickr) via Creative Commons
