Evening by the Springs

What hisses and scares
in the darkening grass
and in the ominous basins of heat?
Phantoms, nothing.

We watch from a distance,
the children and I,
the clouds of steam that rise from the vents
and churn from the mud-boiling springs.

Dark thoughts trace the trail with me,
curling through patches and remnants of fear
embroidered with wonder.
I seem to sense at each new turn
pale rough unknowns, slim spectres,
enlarged by inexperience.
We hurry slowly toward the steam’s source,
eager to see, reluctant to find.

Near the less rapidly bubbling sinks
and craters crusted with lime,
tiny birds test the water’s thin edge,
skitter away, and return.
Softly I take my children’s hands
for the swift comfort of their warm flesh
and of their trustingness.
Together we pass the shadowing spots
beneath the branches where insects hum
and where white fragile webs entrap
the last pale light.
Together we move like the smallest birds
toward new excursions tentatively;
and I am stretched by my ambivalence
to want to reach for my own sake
no less than that of my children’s,
while wanting, too, to be caught in the steam,
held like the light in the web,
indifferent to the pulsing in the dark grass,
unaware of the gathering sundown.

It is that time of year
when all the orange and the gold
that filled the trees
have faded down to gray and brown.
The flocks of geese in standard vees
join forces over the smoky land,
circling once, then fleeing cold.

It used to be a time of year
when sadness fell in sleeting rain,
or snow in sooty flakes came down.
Life seemed a dull monotony:
I circled then but did not flee–
no need like geese to find another space
on milder shores
if all would stay the same.

Now autumn with no change of name
wears a different shape and face,
descends with a poignant kind of grace
that seems harmonious, not dull.
It brings a sense of fullness
before deep winter ice begins.
And even then, when life is in deep freeze,
I look out on the barest trees
that house the creatures who stay in place
to find what the season stores.