melts into a silvery glaze,
plasters October’s leaves to the driveway,
a mosaic of mostly ovate yellows, some shreds
of faded red, here and there a whole,
still green and sharply pointed.  
 
A squirrel streaks across the deck,  
a green black walnut clamped in its mouth.
Already it’s hidden two in plain sight
on the chimenea grate, another in  
the pot of mums. Bits of shell decorate
the deck railing, blacken the webbing of a chair.
 
Invisible chickadees chatter in the arbor vitae.
A junco darts to the neighbor’s feeder,  
then darts away, when a murmuration of  
starlings, south-bound, darkens the vitreous sky.
 
Drifting leaves, a weakened light, portents  
of cold and hunger. It’s time.  


© by CJ Muchhala.
Used with the author's permission.