November hymnal (11)

The bare trees reveal mountains unseen in summer.
Leaves scrape across the road like the words

Of unseen translators looking for an original
Language to give a new season to. I can almost see

This poem assembling as I compose it, rising
In a pile where the wind ebbs and only you,

With a scar on your chest where each word
Thin and twirling on its stem left your branching

Pulse after negotiating the passage between light
And life, only you would stop to read it, unseen

By the neighbors bending to their black bags and rakes,
Your bare shoulders glowing as sun breaks through.