Autumnal

Herbstlich - Atumnal 30 x 20 cm

SOME LEAVES

Maternity leave, sick leave, annual leave, an extended

leave of absence (sounds like a corporate coup d’ etat,

the quiet extermination, say, of a corner-office exec-

utive rat) planes leaving airports only to arrive at

other, nearly identical airports, children

on the verge of leaving home the first time

and so many people we know or don’t know, on the way   

out as well, some permanently, while others leap straight  

into the arms of some astonished Bayadere

on leave from the corps d’ ballet of a “major” company,

and that leaves Ingrid Bergman leaving Humphrey Bogart

at the end of Casablanca blah-blah, or is it he

who leaves her by staying behind with Claude Raines

though it’s hard to believe there are still

people alive who give a shit this way or that,

Nixon leaving the White House aboard

Marine One, a standard departure/arrival technology,

   was pretty weird

and there are the leaves of a maple dining-room table

opening onto a sumptuous view of melted gorgonzola

   on fresh spinach leaves  

and the only leaves outside right now are those leaves clogging

the drain of my balcony—I almost wrote the “brain” of my

balcony—and I once saw the tender mimosa

blossoms of Marrakech which aren’t leaves at all, but I don’t care,  

somewhere in a canary yellow courtyard near the  

souks, the rug market I think, an orange tree in its   

exact dusty middle, and wish I’d never had to leave,

escorted through graceful old age by fawning servants,

obedient wives, and one tender if toothless household pet.

Verdi - Requiem Dies Irae e Tuba Mirum