An Arctic front has scoured the sky
to raw cobalt. The sun rises
and wraps the crepe myrtles
in shawls of dazzling light.
The trees convulse
in a seizure of scarlet
and bright yellow, so vivid
against the cobalt sky
passersby stop to behold them.
My dentist-wife says it’s but a matter
of chemistry: that if the cold
turns the leaves’ chemicals to sugar,
they’re scarlet; if to starch, they’re yellow.
And to think how all through school
my science teachers insisted
that chemistry’s a hard science.
Grey Sparrow Journal 