Fall to Earth
The stubborn little Maple leaf
held on when all its fellows fled.
They carpeting the ground beneath
a vast lushscape of gold and red.
Leaf held on through wind and rain,
the last survivor of its race.
Leaf held on past Turkey day
maintaining there its pride of place.
Then Leaf grew lonely, I suppose-
Like the summer's final rose.
Leaf envied then the flakes of snow
Who fluttered past to their repose.
Then, just as winter came to call,
Leaf felt a tug and then a snap.
Flying, tumbling on the winds
Fall to Earth. Fade to black.
poem by John F. McCullagh
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Related quotes
Mulch ado about nothing?
She took a leaf from off her favourite tree
and held it to the light within her heart.
The pictures it portrayed of what may be
were sadly lacking that one vital part.
She'd hoped the leaf had held some of the two,
who'd sat beneath it's shade so many times.
She sought to see the things they'd yet to do
had they not been exposed to Kismet's crimes.
But, as the leaf was newly born this year
it held none of the essence which she sought.
It hadn't known the love, the hope, the fear.
It knew not of her calculated plot.
She watched it fall to ground, one passing thought.
She walked away, and left it, there to rot.
poem by Hola Mentirosa
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The leaf in the wind
The leaf in the wind
Missed the tree
The tree it was in
That made it be
It fell to the porch
A child held it
And gave it a stroke
Then gently left it
The wind came again
And took it to the sky
Then the sky rained
And it fell to lie
The things on the ground
Kept pushing it away
The wind had an angry sound
It wanted it in its way
So the wind blew
And picked up the leaf
And held it through
Earth’s grief and relief
No tree would claim
The young leaf left
Touched by time
Time itself had left
poem by Ragy Sandid
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Leaves (thread)
under the dogwood
leaves cover
a cat’s grave
early spring
one leaf still dangles
from the tree
palmistry
dew drops on a leaf
pick a vein
widow’s diary
pressed rose petal
the last leaf
with the rain drops
leaves flutter to the ground
fall showers
fallen leaves
circusing in the grass
merry-go-wind
October shower
leaves in the gutter
disembark
leaves changing colors
across the landscape
season's chameleons
morning rain
under maple leaves
tap my shoulder
leaves ripple
with melodies
cicadas song
These were published online by Sketchbook. See September/October “leaves” Haiku thread:
poem by Ben Gieske
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Maple Leaf
I watched a maple leaf’s descent to ground.
It’s downward swaying motion, every now
And then a pirouette without a sound
Until it came to rest so gently down.
I asked myself: A life so brief and yet
So beautiful, is life to be defined
By lasting time and taken for granted?
To go around in circles disinclined
To find profundity-Sad existence!
Ah! But the leaf, its purpose foreordained:
To live a measured life, a subsistence
Profound in many ways and unrestrained.
To waste a lengthy life, so incomplete
I’d sooner live my life a maple leaf.
poem by Albert Ahearn
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Youth’s End
I HAVE held my life too high,
Spring and harvest, love and laughter, smile and sigh.
I should have held it lightly, like a young leaf rent in haste
From the willow in the waste.
A moment in my fingers; then it fluttered, then it fled,
A little flame of red,
To the God-beholding desert where the soundless years go by,–
I have held my life too high.
I have held my death too dear,
Shame or honour, peace or peril, pride or fear.
I should have held it softly, as the little cloud that flies
When the heron takes the skies.
I should have held it kindly as a passing whisper,–'Friend,
Here's the end,
Here the silver cord is loosened and the bowl is broken here,'–
But I held my death too dear.
poem by Marjorie Lowry Christie Pickthall
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Vantage Point
the leaf speaks to the tree,
'i am tree', pounding its chest!
the tree whispers with a smile,
'but my son i am leaf! '...
the ground beneath trembles with laughter,
'yes, and i am sky! '
then the wind comes,
and with a mighty rush,
blows them all away!
three voices rhyming in distant echoes...
'we are wind! '
poem by Eric Cockrell
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Hope Hanging On At Heathrow
Like the last lonely leaf on the London plane,
I drive down, lonesome, up the long airport track,
Still hanging on, through the wind and the rain.
Will you still forgive me, if I just explain?
Will you come home to me? Will you fly back,
Like the last lonely leaf, on the London plane?
I never meant to cause you all that pain
That tears through your heart, bruising it black,
Still hanging on through the wind and the rain.
Do you believe, since my efforts are vain,
It is “THE END”, as in books, at the back
Like the last lonely leaf, on the London plane?
Though you ignore me, with haughty disdain,
You’ll find me waiting, despite your attack,
Still hanging on through the wind and the rain.
Half-hopes cling on; trust’s faint traces remain.
Determined, I stay, since I shall not crack,
Like the last lonely leaf on the London plane
Still hanging on through the wind and the rain.
poem by C. Richard Miles
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The Wood Road
If I were to walk this way
Hand in hand with Grief,
I should mark that maple-spray
Coming into leaf.
I should note how the old burrs
Rot upon the ground.
Yes, though Grief should know me hers
While the world goes round,
It could not if truth be said
This was lost on me:
A rock-maple showing red,
Burrs beneath a tree.
poem by Edna St. Vincent Millay
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Nothing Gold Can Stay
Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf,
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day
Nothing gold can stay.
poem by Robert Frost
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Hold On
I was doomed riding on top a black horse.
Whatever prize there was I could only observe where the troubles starts.
Where does it end?
I cannot be cured...mmm...but if...
I know life would be different if I held on, held on.
I know I could be something if I held on.
Gave her life away. Put it in my pocket when it should've been framed.
Oh lost it's shine. Gotta' get this out of my head, out of my head.
How could it end...end like this?
I could've been...
I know life would be different had I held on, held on.
I know I could've been something had I held on, held on.
I know I could be something if I held on, held on.
I know life would be different if I held on, held on.
Held on, held on, if I held on, held on, if I held on, held on, if I held on.
song performed by by Pearl Jam
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Orange Leaf
Orange leaf passing by
The air is stiff
And cold
Orange leaf passing by
Flying over the snow
Orange leaf passing by
Riding over the snow.
Past the oak tree
The old house is silent
Orange leaf
Fly with the wind
And snow
Fly past the frozen lake
Fish sleeping beneath
Its crystal surface
Orange leaf
fly to the sea
And wait
To be picked up
And carried off
Orange leaf passing by
The air is stiff
And cold
Orange leaf passing by
Flying over the snow
poem by Jesse love
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A Lonely Fallen Leaf
One fine morning
In the season of fall
The leaf pick up made its early round
And the trash was just picked
Sun was shining
The sky was blue
And the wind blew in occasional spurts…
The empty trash bin lay on its side
Rocking and rocking with every blow of the wind.
A lonely dry leaf flew by and landed on the ground
Inching forward and backward as the wind blew,
And the empty trash bin kept on rocking.
The world seemed to be in a dynamic equilibrium
With motion of all its elements synchronized.
I watched with curiosity
If the lonely leaf would be trapped in the bin
And make its way to the landfill mound!
With a final gust of wind
The leaf flew past the bin and away
The wind stopped and the bin lay still
And the leaf, I hope, will find a safe place and degrade
And contribute its share to the ecological parade.
poem by Tirupathi Chandrupatla
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Oddfellowship in Woodstock
Well tell a tale, it shall be brief
It is of rise of Maple Leaf,
From noble Olive Branch it sprung,
And its good deeds shall yet be sung ;
This Encampment, though in its youth,
Glories in friendship, love, and truth
Of all our lodges yet the chief
May be this youthful Maple Leaf ;
Built of good timber, it doth launch
Well worthy of the Olive Branch,
And though it only is a shoot
We hope that it will take deep root,
And soon be vigorous Maple tree
In Canada so broad and free.
And may its usefulness ne'er cease
Sprung from the Olive Branch of peace,
But comfort brothers in distress,
Widows and orphans it will bless,
And console them in their grief,
Protected by the Maple Leaf.
Poor travellers in the wilderness
They oft do suffer great distress,
But may no pilgrim get rude shock
Sojourning here in Woodstock.
poem by James McIntyre
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Awareness
I picked a leaf up from the ground
and compared it to my hand.
Its veins were strikingly similar
and wondered was it planned
that all of life is connected
in ways we tend to forget?
The beauty of this connection
is startling and yet
I know that as the leaf withers away
others will take its place.
And I, like you my dearest friends
will also have to face
withering from gusts of wind
that make the dry leaf unseen.
likened to the gusts of wind
that will wipe our slates clean.
poem by Edwina Reizer
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The Leaf And The Tree And The Roots
if i had to write it again
then i had to, as i must
let you fully understand
the true nature of a vine
the way the leaf swerves
with the wind to give itself
to a fateful fall, the one that
completes its existence as
a leaf to a tree, a part of
a whole, the way it must
settle on the ground and
be with the worms and rot
and fulfills the cycle of its
short existence, and by then
it tells the roots, i am a leaf
i am back and you must now
eat everything in me so i can
be with the bark again so i
can be a leaf again to a tree
that holds me back
and then for another time
lets me fall again.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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A Leaf
to a non-poet a leaf is just a leaf
and when it falls
on the ground, there is nothing but a
fall
but to us who claim this art
a leaf is not just a leaf
but it can be you or i
falling and when i reach the ground
you feel the heart of the leaf
beating
for its falling, its failure as a leaf,
its surrender to a certain death
its claiming a portion of this earth
to rest and be part of this
world, it rots, and it speaks some line
before it rots
a poem, a valediction on an anthill,
an eulogy of the other leaves that
fell before the great falling
it can be a story of humanity written
on the lines of its face, it will have flesh
on its layers, some mouths on its
seams, and it will tell too
about the tree where it comes from
how the clouds drifted so close to its stalk
how the sun kissed it on top of everything
a leaf is a world. just as a poem is.
we live inside it. Through it. Even
outside it. Even in circles.
we make understanding so complicated.
yet we are so simple as you see us.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Like a leaf in the wind
Her soul flutters like a leaf in the wind
Clinging on to tree of life
With nothing more than hope
Devoid of pretense
Shorn of desires
Tossed about, at the whim of a gathering storm
Dark cold has slowed the sap
But deep inside, life fights to surge through
Longing for the next sunny day
When the sap will ease through fluid pathways
Until then, her soul flutters like a leaf in the wind
On a high branch she clings alone
While the other leaves huddle
Warm in their numbers
Sheltered in low branches
Wondering how she has lasted so long
While her soul flutters like a leaf in the wind
When the storm blows harder,
She sometimes feels close to giving up
And sinking quietly to the ground below
Returning to dust, from where she arose
But something in her refuses to let go
While her soul flutters like a leaf in the wind
So come wind, come storm,
Blow as you might
She will cling on to the tree of life
This lone leaf will fight.
poem by Anita Atina
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I Know That You Know How It Feels Tia Maria
i take a look again
eye to eye
to that white-breasted
bird
it flies away in the middle of the rain
leaving a leaf
falling
this time it is the leaf
always alone
always to the bottom of the
wet empty ground
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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The Flask of Time
There is a single leaf flying
in this my autumn gloaming,
a leaf fluttering light
as if being orchestrated
by your words in flight
rushing to my inner ear;
'I have fallen in love
with another you said.'
My leaf stammered,
swaying in its downward flight
unable to remount the tree,
terrified to crash the ground
suspended forever there
as was also true of your words;
better to not reach my inner ear
better to not have my leaf touch down dead.
Between us all these years
neither war, nor peace;
we existed in the troubled middle ground
purgatoried, unsensed, fluttering, leaf bound
frozen between tree and ground.
Now you have burned our tree down-
lit the leaf and made it flame-
and pulled from under us the very ground.
No matter the dead leaves, the burning tree
no matter the absent ground
these things will
in turn return
for the seasons never-end.
Therefore, I shall take my sip of sorrow
sipped slowly from my Flask of Time
and await
the Spring.
poem by Lonnie Hicks
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A Leaf Has Fallen
A leaf has fallen on the ground,
Beliefs have solutions that astound;
Every tree that believed in its wood
Shall learn pain from the heavenly adulthood.
A leaf has fallen on the ground,
Solutions do stem from what is around;
All the flowers give messages in the air,
Their overly beautiful appearance is anywhere.
A leaf has escaped from the branches of a tree
As the wind blows on the older apples carefully;
Their sweetness is called ripeness,
It is the quality of happiness.
poem by Naveed Akram
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