I am a Leaf


Earth Day poem #2

 

 

Before the old streetsweeper comes

I take a lingering look

at the leaves now burnt brown

crusty and curled

on their new concrete bed

down their original home

still standing up to the clearing sky.

I see what they were

before the stampeding wind

tore them off tree branches

summer’s vibrant crown

blanketing the parched ground.

I hear too echoes of their rustles

blending with bird tweets

a serenade for sweet dreams.

Sad, but I know

the streetsweeper will gather them

put them in sacks and with shaken soil

grow new roots and trees.

And so it is not the end

even as the broomstick passes hands

as likewise I will be

one among stacks of fallen leaves

with somewhere else to go

for another season

where no other follows.

 

Erlie Lopez