Page 62

 
Fall 
You tell me the sky's going to fall 
soon, all the gold leaves testing gravity 
on their way down. They'll let go, 
drift, fade past the colors 
of anger. Their voices will rustle 
over the still-green ground. 
When you rise, the shape of you 
lingers in the bent grass, as if 
the earth wants you back 
in its embrace. I watch the blades 
spring up again, all our effects 
unlasting. I've felt it too, your body's 
weight, the grip of your roots 
in me, now windblown, brittle, 
scratching against my skin. 
I keep forgetting to grieve. I keep 
releasing you, like the trees 
making room for something new 
and unguessable. I've shaken you off, 
still beautiful in your last days, red 
on the tree, turning to gold as you fall. 
Tisha Turk 
Poet's Statement 
Falling is, of course, one of the most common metaphors for how we end up
in 
love or out of it. I wrote this poem at the end of September, when the leaves
out- 
side my window were just beginning to turn; I wanted to think not just about
what 
falls but about what's left behind after the fall, the roots and branches
that remain, 
the shift from necessary connection to separation. It was an easy poem to
begin 
but a difficult poem to finish. 
62