Autumn Poem by Charl JF Cilliers

The time is near, this season of the year.
Shadows have shifted on the sundial’s face.
The ornament of time’s now out of place.
Increasingly we are as we appear.

Unseasonally a last few breaths
of warmth may, down constricting veins,
force the last sweetness of the season from the earth.
But blown leaves have left the plane

tree bare. The birds sing into longer shadows too.
The days are shorter than they may appear.
The hours hasten, from fewer down to few.
The time is near, this season of the year.