Shuttling Time

Poem by Meredith Betz

 

Slender trees like warps in a loom stretched taut

Broken reeds weft through them

overlaid by umber flags of the forest

outside my window,

a variegated cloth.

Leaves from the ancient oak

slowly dot the earth below.

The Weaver shuttles time.

 

Shadows cast patterns that split the lighted ground

into splinters of memories

of welcoming autumn

tunneling through

mounds of spent leaves

soon to be bonfires on the curb,

squealing with delight upon discovery

by my father now long gone.

 

Behind my glass pane,

I invoke my gleeful self to scoff at time.

Then I attend the retreating summer

Imagining riding a crimson leaf from the maple

like an ultralight plane

wafting, grinning, descending

toward my pillowing companions on the ground

nesting into the down below.

 

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Meredith Betz is a former high school Communications/English teacher whose avocation is coaching students of all ages in writing and delivering presentations. Currently she writes for the Nonprofit Quarterly. Her vocation is executive coaching and organizational consulting to for profit and nonprofit organizations.