Another Leaf

     
Another Leaf
 
In the city’s loneliness,
alone, among the crowds,
she spent her final years and then
she sickened and was gone.
 
And only one or two were there
who called, before the message
said, “disconnected”. That was that.
Her e-mail goes unanswered.
 
How many like her? “Well, that’s life.”
the city dweller says.
“We meet at work and on the streets
and go upon our ways.”
 
Relatives?  She did have some,
but all in distant places.
Friends?  She’d some. But then they died,
or moved to better climates.
 
The super threw out all her stuff.
What else was he to do?
And walking on the sidewalk, I
picked up a thing or two.
 
A picture.  She was with a boy.
“Her son, perhaps?” I wondered.
“But where was he?” An idle thought.
I left it on the sidewalk.
   
******
   
I’d seen her walking, slowly, by.
I used to say hello.
She sometimes would respond and pause
to lean upon her walker.
   
The summers, autumns, winters pass.
The springs are celebrated.
But who remembers her, who so
to live and die was fated?
  
The autumn nears, and brittle leaves
are drifting on the road.
I step upon a leaf and hear
it crunching underfoot.
   
I stop and with regret I look
at the little leaf I crushed.
But then I think, “That leaf was dead.”
and leave its bits behind.
 
2014  August 10th, Sun.
Brooklyn, New York