How fitting (5/19/25)

How fitting, 

to come to and end of things—

an end of comfort—

in the still sadness of early autumn.

How fitting,

in the sudden shocking chill of October’s entrance,

in the sorrowful early-sleeping sun,

these aged internal wounds surface:

this salt-cured ache, 

the long-preserved lone bitter thawed

at the strike of an axe,

the naive juvenile warmth of summer

disintegrated.

The humid late-rising heat no longer

coats the brain as does

cough syrup on the tongue,

an inevitable languishing.

The vacuum of an afternoon absent of light

in dusk’s rush to hibernate.

And how significant those micro-pleasures become,

brief smiles from strangers, 

sensory-induced memories, 

CD’s burned in unconditional love,

hot early dinners, 

mom’s skillet cassoulet, 

dad’s army-sized slow-cooked spaghetti sauce,

the satisfied-full sighs,

catch-the-flag and 

mason jars with pen-poked caps full of fireflies

popsicle-walks through the meadow

in the seasoned September sun,

candied hands that don’t care whether they’re 

sugar-sticky or bleach-scrubbed 

in an effort to blank-slate 

the mind.

The absence of the problem

of deserving.