The Autumnal Wall

by R. D. Ashby

Too thick for the sonnet,

its detail in leaves

too great a catch

for some trawling quatrain;

its spoiled summer's green

breaking like a new sea:

a tide's third pride

rippling the pooled recession.

Behind it, a garden.

In the midst of trees

a Mosaic event:

a rod strikes, a sea

overflows, is flattened

to lace, is wind-stirred leaf:

the wall is released

in a compassion -

spoiled: this new artistry

is degenerate, no bluff,

no rehearsal for flowers,

but a dropping to the drains;

twig skeletons - ugliness

is obviated in obedience:

This is the virtue

of the autumnal wall:

its stark quatrain, its febrile

sonnet - its all!

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