Ode to the Third of November

Oh, great good glow and volume of you –
cold November afternoon! – forgive me
for not having sooner caught your coming on –
attended to your slow deliberate dilation –
incremental widening – beginning with your

bringing in the somnolent soft vestiges
of dawn – a silent entry, fawn-like, to the sweet
enlarging clearing of the day, assuming your
exacting role in a Chekhovian-sly play:
seductively ambiguous – edging out a fine

and sharp array of gently biting color –
your portion of the fund of autumn’s alchemy –
your secret palette – opalescent pearl whose
valiant glimmer stuns a little – brittle bits
and jolts of gold that prick the eye – diffusions

of pink-gray, lit from within, enlivening –
still fresh with sun, still not quite under
the penumbral cold indifference of a winter
still to come – oh, let me live in you a while –
breathe you in before inevitable evening.

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