Seasons of Change

By Casper Orr

Cycles encapsulate a multitude of things;
the seasons, circles of the lives of monarchs,
and my unstable self-image,
ever-changing with the yellow leaves in autumn.
Cycles bring change.

If the whisper of it from past my shoulder did not paralyze me,
I’d be in several different places at once, 
scattered in winter squalls.
Change surges waves of intrusions into my beaches,
ones that I do not have the buoys to resist.

A change like when my aunt lost all the leaves off of her birch bark scalp,
a bare bark tree.
Five autumns in, and I had come to the realization that those 
that are most precious might rot; might fall to the first frost.

I’m five autumns in and the tree of my aunt shudders,
leaves now replaced by scarf,
tying the pieces together, the pieces that keep breaking.
I can feel my own breaking, too,
but a different kind, a fearful kind.
I steal her scarves to hold me together, to tether me to land.
I wish someone had told me it was more than leaves or scarves 
that smooth out the breaks in my branches. 

Eleven summers, 
I am lost in a sea of strangers and they can all see what I cannot.
If I am a friend,
why must I climb through apple orchards,
grasping for toss-aways with rotten cores?
If I am a friend,
why must I be content with what a dying garden has to offer?
I miss spring in the past grove,
An orchard where my branches weren’t too gnarled and my tree wasn’t so small.

Seventeen springs, 
and I have floated through the air as though I am pollen,
unsure of where I’m going to land.
Future plans for future seasons have changed so many times. 
I’ve just circled back to the beginning,
so many wasted springs under my belt.
They say my plans are an expensive penthouse in the city,
thousands have tried to pay rent before me,
only to fall short and behind as I frequently do.
I surely will not be able to pay rent.
Maybe so.

If it is, I will hole up in my foreclosed dream,
curl up around myself and keep warm with my poems and prose,
quilted together in a delicate stitchwork that can only be read as mine.
A chrysalis of my own creation, 
I will fear to be reborn, 
as I fear any change and there is a standstill.

But without change,
scarves would snap beneath the belly of the wind,
garden weeds would grow evermore rotten,
and I would see only a blank page in place of the future.

It was Autumn when I rose again 
and now change brings just that;
Change.

Casper Orr (he/him) is a writer from northern New Jersey and is currently studying literature and creative writing. He spends his time outside of class writing poetry, prose, short fiction, and nonfiction. A volunteer editor for The Fruitslice magazine, Casper has contributed to Gypsophila. He has had several pieces of work previously recognized by the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards.