Taking a draught of Autumn draft
I stopping sought
on the air
the old subtle sting, butcher’s shop smell
Or the aura of blackening coffee beans
smoky incense, thick through and hanging around
A hundred of those old suburban towns
Each of one street
Each with a thousand tree-closed tunnels and
Luminous dead-orange
Maroon soaked arches
Cathedrals
Their dying architecture passing through
more years in an hour
–wilting, falling–
than those Autumns I’ve left to pass on foot
