Sweet Gum Shawl
The sweet gum leaves spill
across the green of the forest
like some magnificent Indian Yellow
pashmina shawl, flipped to the side
by a femme fatale.
Flowing loosely in drapes across
the lush pine needle velvet
each leaf like a separate tatted star
made of silk thread and fashioned
with care by the Creator.
I wrote this poem as part of a series of poems that will be published in a book very soon. It was a particularly gorgeous fall that year and I took many pictures of the forest and the many configurations of leaves. Today, this poem reminds me of a femme fatale I knew... a woman, a friend who passed away last week. She was a karaoke singer who loved to sing the country songs. She was tall and thin with long straight black hair to her waist, She always wore boots, boots with a short, short skirt or torn up jeans. She had a lovely face with clear,brooding dark eyes. She could have played the beautiful Sacagawea in a Hollywood film or biopic about Cher. She was always animated and soulful. She had a stroke while singing her heart out at the mike (so we are told!). She left behind two babies who will never hear her sing. Everything in life is so fragile. The lovely yellow leaves which swathed the trees when I took these pictures are long gone... all turned brown and decomposing on the forest floor. We must capture these precious moments of life when we see them. But, to do that, we have to recognize them. I took the pictures of the colorful leaves one fall when the weather had been cold early enough to transform The Piney Woods into miles and miles of luscious color. I wish I had taken my friend's picture when she was singing her sad songs and she was dancing and alive.
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