METAMORPHOSIS

  
Dead leaves fallen to ground, lying
Lifeless until stirred by wind and swirled
Into air, a last dance before - sodden -
They sink to earth, dissolving slowly to soil.

So life ebbs away fitfully to otherness
Clinging for a while like a withered leaf
On a bare branch, a bright echo of verdure
In yellow, rust, ochre  — drifting, each gust

Bringing more of them to the forest floor:
A carpet of delight before colours fade,
Leaching to brown loam for tree roots
To re-imagine each leaf in some far time

Beyond winter. So we leave the world we know
Hanging on, echoing a life that has left, remembering
And then remembered; meanwhile transformed
To new life somehow, somewhere in time’s flow.