Outside My Window Xv Poem by Frank Avon

I try not to look.
It's October,
talk of frost.
The sunshine is garish.
Instead, i stare
at the keyboard before me,
black plastic: a s d f j k l;

What's almost over
is no longer summer:
the only thing that goes on forever
is the end: always it's over.

What will come again
will never be the same,
already isn't. The tendrils
of Joseph's Coat are
unblooming; the giant hibiscus
has majestic foliage, but
not a single bud of crimson;
the zinnias have faded, their
stems and leaves powdered with
what must be fungus, or age,
faded, jaded, awaiting euthanasia;
mounds and mounds of marigolds
festooning the concrete ramp,
flaring, flamboyant orange over-
spreading inanimate grayness, with
late bloomers tall and rangy,
overtopping all the others,
attracting bumblebees and little
yellow butterflies flickering
among them. Shade from the neigh-
bor's oaks is shadows. What ages
well - well, nothing much.

Next spring some things will
spring forth again, but not
the same. Next summer someone -
I hope it will be me - will
put out other plants, here or
elsewhere. But for now -

well, I refuse to choose a word,
not farewell or adios or adieu,
nope, not seeya! The poetry of

these last (almost) warm days
has to reside only in their
names, the ones that insist on
surviving: cosmos, bachelor's
buttons, Mr. Lincoln, Mirandy,
mums (bronze & purple) , New Dawn.