On An Autumn Day Like This

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On An Autumn Day Like This


Written by 


David Steven Simon


On an autumn day like this

when the leaves 

shed their modesty

and change

like flirty high school girls

in a doors wide open

pastoral dressing room

emerging as scarlet women

only to retreat and return

in their anorexic

bare branch winter clothes

I sit 

on this

pine-slatted

Central Park bench

autographed by lovers 

painted by pigeons

and long for the days

when everyone was still here

until they began to disappear

And I was left

an orphan of the late November darkness

waiting for the light to return

which makes 

what lies ahead

as heartbreaking as goodbye

and as fragile

as forever 

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