Change

Fall comes whistling softly
like one who wants to be felt
but not yet seen. It’s like holding
and holding a door ajar,
hoping the cat will choose in or out.

After long, sweaty months
with night settling in by ten p.m.,
dawn knocking us awake, 
a flash bulb at six a.m.,
the long dusk folds its gray curtain,
shaking out cool morning mist.

Time that held its breath
for days while heat rose in waves
expels it with a sudden wind
that causes windows to fly open,
houses to inhale, cough out mildew.

We shed a season’s lassitude,
gearing up brain and bones
for some slow forward movement.
We are on the verge, perched
between skin and sweaters.

Sharon Scholl is a retired college professor (humanities) who convenes a poetry critique group and volunteers as editor of local literary journals. She serves as her church pianist and maintains a website of original music compositions at www.freeprintmusic.com for small liberal churches. At age 90 she is still active as part of a piano duo. Her poetry chapbooks (Remains, Seasons, Timescape) available via Amazon Books. Individual poems are current in Gyroscope Review and Rockvale Review.