November Light

The trees have shed their arguments,
standing bare against the gray,
each branch a question mark
pointed at the sky.

The pond holds still—
a mirror for the geese
who cross it twice,
once in flight, once in reflection,
neither version quite the truth.

The wind has changed its mind again,
pushing leaves across the road
like scattered pages
from a book nobody finished.

And the light—
that low, amber light of November—
slants through everything
as if the sun is trying
to read the world
one last time before it sets.

I stand at the edge of the field
where the grass has gone to gold,
and I think about the things
that only silence teaches:

how a season ends
not with a sound
but with a softening,

how the earth lets go
without being asked,

how even the shortest days
carry more light
than we remember.