Three kingdoms vie - of frosts and mist and sun -
bright tunnels in late morning looming light;
by afternoon all trace of mist has gone -
frost-stamps, 'indelible', may last the night.
Sun's blind, blinding singer. (Frosts grip, keep mum.
Clear night they'll have haunting under a moon.)
No time for idylls, though deep paeans thrum
from fire-arc through dark thorn-boles down so soon.
"So soon through," pigeons croon; dog-barks call time;
the blackbirds rattle, "Something odd's afoot."
Curlicues of apple twigs asleep in sign -
how white-gold back-light wraps the west in soot.
Then white frosts murmur of this dusk's cold home
when green must drain and all fall monochrome.
