The leather work gloves look cowboy serious. I’m raking leaves but could just as easily be rustling cattle or fixing the barb wire fence mangled in last spring’s big storm. There is no fence or wild steer – just this rowdy maple rearing up on hind legs, loose and fierce in autumn winds.

The cars on Abby Place have out-of-town plates. Their windshields are frosted over, and the guests are all asleep. Soon they’ll wake and make a big breakfast or walk down to the Waffle Shop and then off to the football game. Our paths won’t cross. They’ve brought their out-of-town bubble with them.

In the morning colors of fire, orange, pink, and peach, the in-between spaces flash a different type of light, a type of absence colored by shades of blue: light turquoise, arctic, bleu celeste. Nothing stirs in the foreground – no squirrels, no finches, no warblers or nuthatches. Frost glazed grass warming and waking.

Setting sun, setting sun – we chase, we chase, we run, we run. The maple leaves not fallen yet curl upwards cupping with purpose the golden light. Perhaps that’s what allows them to hold on and hold out. A northern flicker bobs his red-capped head. Mosquitoes and gnats dance in a disappearing beam.

While looking up the origins of puncture, punctuate, and punctual, hundreds of chattering birds, black against a gray sky, swarm two tall trees – tussled by their landing. A hawk swoops down in their direction and they’re off again. Commas and periods chased by a question mark with the speed of an exclamation.

Insects chirping in the late October warmth remind me of what it means to hold on – perhaps without consciously holding on. Ghosts and memories pass in autumn winds. Do the crickets remember warmer nights? Do the brittle leaves taste different – more bitter than their sweet gum spring? Chirping as instinct, maybe lamentation.

Smoke hangs low above the trees by the mountainside highway. The valley below, hazy in its waking, waits blanketed. The paper mill shift started three hours ago. It was dark then – in this town where you expect to see the new shift walking to work, lunch pails in hand, traffic lights blinking. 

In the other room, sports analysts squawk and I retreat. Here, Art Blakey & The Jazz Messengers walk methodically through the morning. I tap out the beat to “Dat Dere” on the dog’s head draped across my legs. He looks unamused – squinting his eyes with each tap. The drummer? The dog? Blakey?

Morning headache, pinprick shiver of a body chill. When I close my eyes and “look around,” I hear and feel a staccato throb double pulse in my temples and ears: two punches landing in a deflated Mylar balloon – chh chh, the double snare drum tap on flappy, loose snares – wish swish.

The shuttle driver, an older oaf of a man, shares, “his nose won’t stop bleedin’ – he’s got so much gunk up in there, must be the time of year.” He wrestles and strains with his seat belt. Our minivan drifts left towards the parked SUV. “C’mon you son of a bitch.” Click. 

Late light and long shadows drape this sweater sleeve afternoon across the yard – a shining kiss on the rosy-cheeked young maple and the red, red barn. It’s the type of day where we might feel halfway to something that doesn’t have an end, like a day or a sky or yesterday’s rainbow.