Little Black Dot

yesterday morning i got to the shop and miria says to me,
so what do you think, chelsea,
do you think the summer's back is broken?
and i looked at her and i thought about it and i took inventory of my outfit:
beret scarf wool turtleneck moccasins
(cold feet)
and i recalled the trees outside the brickyard only days earlier,
their surreptitious leaf-dropping, and i said,
yes. i think it is.

something in the air. something in the sun.
something about the dusk in the studio at twenty past seven.
i bemoaned socklessness in the middle of the day and was given a pair
(white, handknit by miria's 92 year old mother) and when i put them on
i gave kukka a big cuddle and said, look, little cat, our back paws match.
woolly white socks on our little black legs.

something, too, about the sickness. the sickness brought by the turning.
two nights in a row of profound nausea followed by
fifteen hours of sleep last night.

and now my hair is a mess because it's eleven a.m. and i just woke up
and i'm wearing my furlined moccasins and there is cloud cover and
a chill and maybe i won't even leave the house today.
maybe i won't even.