Drops of Color/ A Change

Drops of Color
A Change

There is a change in the air.

The season has revealed
its timeless face
—Sun rising early
—Reflections of the sea
     in the blue skies overhead
—The gulls cry
     as the surf crashes into a shore
     laboring for the sea’s salt
     seeping into sands.

I have stood here
a myriad of times.
Yet, when I look out,
I see within a growing change.

What is it?
What are these words writing themselves?

They are waves
having passed this way before,
but now its movement different.

Like reading the same book twice
or listening to the Scriptures
—the same verse
—a hundred times
     yet, on the one hundred and first time
     there is a change.

How is it I never heard it
until now?

What opens the ear?

Silently, the sounds of the season
carry the vessel a last time
before the winter months
lift the sails.

Riding on the sea, side saddle,
the waves buck the bow.

Holding the rein,
the season speaks.
“I shall return
and so, too, you
—changed.”

Recalling what was,
holding the helm
carried in the direction
of the orange flame
lifting from the pool,

this sailing boat
trusts it is home.