Sounds of pawing through the larder
Damp harumphs, the children
We transposed from San Francisco
Blank as slates
Their mouths now burst
With Halloween candy and balk
New England’s polite processions
The incandescent flush
Of deciduous hills and pretty
Village orchards, so far from the Pacific
Their reproach is manifest
In cups of cloudy cider
Untouched upon a sideboard
The apples we drove to pick, uneaten
Uncontained by a wide, clay bowl
We bought in Sausalito
Withering
Unsliced, they keep
The secrets of their stars
Under stern red cloaks
