The skies are slowly, fully falling
into the forest’s lifted hands,
breath-soft whispers of a language
friends of stars could understand.
Clinging velvet, how it robes
all things with glassy clarity
and turns this world into another
where anything could come to be.

Perhaps it’s not transfiguration,
but this is how things really are,
this teeming planet, whitely marbled,
spinning round its golden star.
Perhaps the children always knew the
things we know not how to know–
I believe them when I see
the songbirds settling on the snow.

Brittle winter, sleepy sunshine,
candlelight on frosted glass,
the common finds impartial splendor–
maybe this will be, at last,
the moment that we live our living,
and hear the storied silence call.
Fall, soft skies, and settle on us,
make believers of us all.

Claudia Lehman lives in Lebanon city with lots of books, tea, and her favorite man ever. She loves exploring the world of words, teaching children, and feels most at home in the woods.