Photo by Ingrid Mathews

I swam a last goodbye
To summer
In October
And as I waded in
I saw
The lake belonged to me
No other soul
Had ventured in to share
The cold
A row of clear September nights
Bestowed
I didn’t saunter in
But made the plunge at once
As now or never
A momentary second thought
Engulfed me with the chill
But when I dove down deep
I found a bit of summer heat
Had made an ardent stand
Against the siege
And dug my toes into the sand
To find more summer still
And feeling reassured
I set out for the middle of the lake
And from this vantage point
I saw again
I was the only one to venture in
And I wondered why the others left
Too soon it seemed to me
But then
Not even call of loon was there
To keep me company
Or break my solitude
As quiet echoed over empty lake
And cottages around the rim
Resigned and sighed and settled back
To hibernate within the pine
I wondered if the fishes thought me strange
Or whispered to each other
That I was out of season
In this calendar
Where blueberries foretold the end
In scarlet flame along the shore
A burnished frame around the edge
Of languid days
And birches flashed in gold leaf coins
To signal summer spent
And now only the maples wait
But soon enough will
Acquiesce and follow suit
And red and coral flags
Will wave a last farewell
And that will be my cue
To make a fall surrender too



Sara Mathews      October 2015