Waiting for Fall to Begin

Summer rips its seams with opulent banquets of plenty;
Giddy days of gluttony await grim reaping,
And still, I sit here, penitent, waiting to be scolded.

Even the leaves begin to blush as they look on;
They sense the shame of greedy humiliation.
Fat heads of corn bow down to hide their faces.

Fruitful is the basket of this valley,
Potent, like a graft from Jesse's rod.
And I, swollen with summer, fit to burst and rot.

Fall slowly wakes, in a funeral procession;
Austere, severe, and tragic to a fault;
A mirror to regret, and to fleeting memory.

(12 lines)