It’s been so long that I’ve been here.

 

The leaves are changing again–

falling and floating down into

shallow moving streams and still puddles, stagnant 

between moss covered rocks

like bits of of orange and yellow confetti or

sprinkles on a birthday cake

or fish food flakes that miss the mouths and sink to settle

onto the bottom. 

 

It should be so beautiful–

 

when bright falling flashes of decay 

slalom from treetops on a downward course through crisp mountain air.

 

It is beautiful. I know that.

 

It’s just been so long 

since I’ve seen it.

 

Three years, now

 

since that fall,

When the light was lost in me

and the whole wide world

went dark.

 

And the leaves changed 

and they fell 

as I fell, 

as I 

opened my mouth to suck in the air but swallowed 

the water, 

breathed deeply down

this cold, dark mountain water, where then

a single, yellow leaf

bright and dying

flowed in and down and settled 

into the stagnant, mossy nook between two rocks

where my heart used to be.

 

Since then, 

nothing has moved me or moved 

in me. 

 

It was as beautiful then as it is now, I’m sure.

But still, I cannot see it.