September Weeps
Jim Burns

A friend of mine died
the week before his name
came up on the
heart transplant
waiting list.
He finally won the lottery
but was too dead to celebrate,
and as the emergency techs
worked on him
on the cold tile floor of his home,
the house with the front doormat
saying, Go Away,
the last words he heard
might have been his wife,
Goddamn you, you’re not
going to die on me now,
but he did anyway.
Moving forward,
the point is that
Willie Nelson singing
September Song
was played at his funeral,
and the days do grow short
when you reach September
as they dwindle down
to that precious few,
that precious few
before pretty September,
with her crisp air
and palette of colors
to splash on the trees,
gives up the good fight
and cedes the world over
to the witches and goblins
of unpredictable October,
then dark November,
heralding the atrocities
of intractable winter.
September has done her job,
but she weeps.