ON THE BLUEST HILL

In whirlwind gusts
every leaf was gone
in the coal green darkness
of early dusk
of the Fall's bluest hill
daring the frosted birch
to acknowledge
premonitions of our fate
in a living windy move
of rain on wellsprings
gathering by aspen
of sparrow and grackles
behind smothered brushwood
and a poet in a red scarf
from luminous days
living a hundred years
beyond the clearing
seizes on memories of words
to rejoin his quick step
asking for wonders and signs
in the slanting sunset.