The knock of fall is not so exuberant
as the rousing knock of spring.
More hollow, more halo, more vacant, less
green. Barren and sterile and stark
and gray, it has taken many years
to even hear the knocking, knocking
on doors I never even knew were here.
And here they are, doors to rooms inside
full of nothing and vaster nothing.
Layers of nothing and veils of nothing
and there are no words that will do for nothing.
And still I try. Why? A man I know tells me
he no longer writes. No need to, he says.
Nothing to say. And part of me
envies him the quiet. And part of me
thrills in just hearing the knock,
delights in knocking back.