By Steven Cramer

Featured Art: Bolete & Bird by Dylan Petrea

It got bad; pretty bad; then not
so bad; very bad; then back to bad.
Jesus, let’s let things not get even worse.

A weird fall. Nearly ninety
one day, leaf mold making our house
all red eyes and throats. Don’t think

about Thanksgiving, but hope
for a decent Halloween. Everywhere
gas-powered leaf-blowers growling—

Christ, let’s let things not get even worse.

Steven Cramer has published six poetry collections, including Listen (MadHat Press, 2020), Goodbye to the Orchard, and Clangings. Goodbye to the Orchard won the Sheila Motton Prize from the New England Poetry Club and was named a Massachusetts Honor Book in Poetry. Recipient of grants from the Massachusetts Cultural Council and the National Endowment for the Arts, he founded and now teaches in the Low-Residency MFA Program in Creative Writing at Lesley University.

Originally published in NOR 6