Summer's demise witnessed from the safety of a coffee shop

Car parts and human skulls - art of Haiti on show

The Guardian, 22 October 2012

Mocking the old tree's thinning

leaves of browning green

and tangerine, artifacts of crimson

and violet, cotton and scarlet,

aquamarine, honey and bone.

Coffee and cream. Stars, spangles

and woven flowers helix round

and skelter down its wizened spine,

wind chimes shining, dream

catchers snatching from its limbs,

strung like dew on spiders’ silk.

The city kids are learning

about the harvest. A tin man

hangs, soup can arms held wide

like Christ, his head, once filled

with coffee beans, now hollow,

no heart beats in his bucket

chest. Like the Wicker Man

he exists only to be filled, his void

reminiscent of a missing child.

(c) 2012 Slush Poet