The Hushing

The last gold leaf lets go, a spinning sigh,

It clicks on brittle grass, no longer pliant.

The air, once sweet with cider, smoke, and rot,

Now smells of iron, distant, sharp, defiant.

A final, weary rustle shakes the bough

Where stubborn russet clings, a memory,

The wind’s thin whisper shifts its language now,

From mournful song to chilling prophecy.

Then, silence.

A waiting, heavy pause,

That stretches taut across the sleeping land.

The world holds its breath, obeys new laws,

Gripped in a sudden, crystallizing hand.

The cold descends, not as a gentle guest,

But as a presence, absolute and stark,

A weightless pressure on the planet’s chest,

A gathering of purpose in the dark.

And then, the sound.

Not loud, but infinitely small,

A billion tiny fractures, whispers, clicks,

As rime adheres and hoar-frost starts to crawl.

A crackle, as the frozen puddle ticks.

The *sound* is silver, delicate and keen,

A crystalline percussion, faint and clear,

The brittle whisper of a world unseen,

The very breath of winter, drawing near.

The dawn reveals the work the night has done:

A pale, flat light on meadows washed in white.

Each naked branch, a diamond in the sun,

Each blade of grass, a shard of frozen light.

The world is hushed, and sharpened, and defined,

The muddy, blurred-edge softness, gone.

A new-old stillness settles on the mind,

With the first, stinging breath of winter’s dawn.