a constant buzzing was all you could hear
aside from cottonwood trees shimmering
every now and then.
Now brown ashes fall from the sky
instead of snow from the trees, their bodies
now cover the ground crunching under our feet
as if the leaves have fallen, like days
are dying too.
Too soon, it seems, the summer breeze has molted
into an autumn chill that whispers like cottonwood
tree’s cascading leaves, no longer green but gold;
shards of the sun crunching beneath boots,
crunching bodies like June bugs who once
polluted the air.