Again this year it comes:
the shift in the wind
that certain slant of sun
the sudden red of sumac.

Out at the lake
birdsong is less urgent,
the young can feed themselves.
In a few days 
something like light
will tug on wings.

I am at home with
the downside of summer.
I take stock of the woodpile.
Night comes earlier. The space
between cricket chirps, longer.
I’ve stopped coloring my hair.

My husband fingers the gray
as if learning a tenderness.

This poem first appeared in Secondwind.
Used here with the author’s permission.