The Fidelity of Crows

This is the leaving time of year.
Summer shade falls in pieces to the ground
clearing the sky of everything but flight

and discarmined branches, the loyal crows
roosting there. They remain to supply us with choices
other than the stropping of the wind

the fading echoes of geese wings or
the scritch on asphalt of the discarded leaves, some
still fledged in the colors of their death.

—Shelly L. Hall, from Alum