HOARY

AUTUMN

WIND

Austere and nonrelenting hoary wind,

why do you come with angry voice

to ravage and steal away these tresses
which decorate my limbs?

Why did you, first, deosculate my beauty,
then come to bare and rip away
my dignity and splendor
with your mighy thrust?

Vermillions, ochers, rusts and greens
are shorn to leave me naked, here, and cold.
Why did you come to weather and scatter
my assemblage ­­– to let it be trod underfoot?

The wooded hills, my home, provide no place
for me to keep and hide my colored gems.

I have pleased the eye of many,
but your bold charade of undulating billows
offers no respite and will not be postponed.

Is there no stationary spirit of respect
to hold, encompass and protect me?
Trapped by nature’s laws of motion and change
I must abide by your will.
Can you feel and hear my silent cry of pain
mingling with your angry voice

that echoes through the hills?

By Mary L. Ports