Here I sit. A plane loudly flies overhead.
We don’t get many of those, too remote,
mostly contrails from jets high above.
Three quarters of my sheltering tree’s leaves
litter the ground and picnic table. Fragments
of my last year’s life lie with them,
brown and decaying.

As usual, cats are everywhere, but
with less ‘clear’ space to play.
I had my daughter rake trails for the animals
to their favorite spots. Cats are meticulous
in their paths, hating to make noise.
Ha! I’m the opposite, I make lots of noise,
while choosing the easiest path…

Fall. Most of my frost-sensitive flowers and plants
droop and splay forlornly in the gardens.
I’m thinking of falling, mind-falling,
a preoccupation in my slow-moving world.
Yet, the days speed up with terrible force,
I feel reckoning coming, mistakes
to be rectified, and I grow weary.

Weary of emotions of stupidity,
and rampant greediness and hate.
Where will it end? To what extremes
can we take this planet? I think
we already know. We will destroy it, us.
We’ve read it in SciFi books, in articles,
seen it in our minds. We are all worried,
wonder how to help stop cutting
our own throats.

It’s not easy. Indoctrination is mind washing.
Squeaky-clean minds. Ready for the next
righteous offering, latching onto
planned propagandas; the mind wasters,
the spirit killers, designed as ‘busy-work’
to keep humanity obliqued.

I hear this eerie rustling sound hollowing,
like it’s dying. I look around, then up.
It’s the tree, the wind in the scant fixture
of yellow leaves is causing them
to sing a lament. For their lives are falling.
But, I see the tree stills stands…

Erin Elizabeth Kelly-Moen
© Copyright 12/8/04