for Wendell Berry

All year long, it has ripened to this.
At the edge of the field–stubble, now, with harvest home–
it stands forlorn of half its leaves.
Some have fallen; wind has borne many away.
The upper third, on the southwest side,
is all bare branches, twigs and trunk,
spires or thin fingers trending upward.
They point to something higher.

"If someone wants to know, I've said something about Indiana."

Below, wreathing the girth of its main growth,
leaves orange-red with the lateness of the year
clothe the naked branches
and rustle whispers of first frost.
They speak of earth, which they will blanket soon:
this tree will shed its remaining glory
and sleep at last in a semblance of its death,
waiting past all knowledge of its awakening again.

"He said something about Indiana, Henry. That's all he said."

But for now it stands, hieratic,
a tongue of fire a few feet above the brown earth,
prophetic of new birth,
a testament of its fidelity
and a chronicle of its survival,
yielding the last of its fruit – its best –
only to the wind and time
– and the pull of earth, which is inexorable.

"Lyda said he said something about Indiana."

Jonathan Evans