Autumn is burning, turning,
all green grown is suddenly fire,
lit from within in the fading dusk.
The vital hue descending,
to the root and rhizome we all go,
to our essential darkness, but not before
our luminous colors reveal the passing
of our substance, our quest, our earnest effort
at some small good and holy godhood.
One last flare into the coming night!
One fierce instinct to speak of love
into the span of all that is.
James Scott Smith 