Autumn Leaves

-- by Damian Conway

And then she was gone.

In an instant,
Wheeling through the emptiness alone
Where once our thoughts had winged together
Like echoes of laughter.
Silent as a tear down that granite face,
Fluttering like a torn dream,
Reaching out to me,
Reaching.
Soundlessly goodbye,
Soundlessly crumpling on the hard dead earth below.

Gone, as the silence roared about me,
Cooling, as I scrambed through that infinite descent,
Cold, as I reached down to brush the ants
From her lovely, shattered face,
Her lovely, empty eyes.

They buried her in white.
On a cold grey winter's morning.
As they bury each of us -
Alone.
As they'll bury me some day.
When I stop falling.