Poem

- for Michele Murray

The window, visible from the pillows
fills and shakes with yellow leaves.
They are ash leaves, not the gray of ash
but the gold of old paper, dust
and saffron-dyed ribbon, the gold
of things locked in attic trunks.
They fall, lost under the sill's white ledge.
You can't see them touch the ground.

Collected belongings of the bedside table:
the chosen photos, bottles, empty page
and pen that points like a compass needle
toward your hand, wavering with readiness.
The minutes hang on their thin threads.

Waiting. There will be no more waiting
after this, the last crease smoothed,
last child dressed, sent down the steps
with lunch packed in a crinkled sack,
the last book closed gently toward the left,
settling like the lid of a jewelry box.
The click of a latch is all it is.
The soft sound of closure, the tiny snap
of a dry leaf pulling from its stem.

copyright 2006 Jacqueline West
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