October blows dust, summer
long gone into a dark barn
like a hiding lover. Autumn
buries my life as the heavy,
fallen leaves and first hard frost
choke the grass.
My lover loves me
and grants me my loneliness
beneath a sky of steel-tipped
stars. The huge sun, yellowed
like an old bruise,
slips behind the hedgerows.
Who among us is holy?
One with myself, I kissed
the skin of a stone, and
heard the sea, the sea
rolling out, whispering
as dark as wine in a skin
or in its cold jar—the nightmare
silence is broken; I go to my lover
and am lonely no longer. At dusk
our slow breath thickens in
the air: begin with the rock;
end with the water.
Shut the kitchen door slowly
behind me
with a click.
Christopher Kuhl has published poetry, essays and short fiction extensively in on-line and print
journals. He has also written eleven free-ranging books of poetry and prose, exploring the
interactive human, natural and spiritual worlds. You can follow him and his fidgety brain on his
Facebook author’s page, Christopher Kuhl Writer.
