Day Eighteen

Autumn Winds

Autumn-yellow mushrooms
Form belled-out pant legs at
The base of a tree,
Matching the picture I
Saw in a magazine.

You quip an age-old joke
About “fun guys” and
Old is made new again in
Our children’s bright, happy laughter
Carried across the campsite, on the wind.

My face is warm, wind-burned;
Bones chilled, from its
Constant whipping
Even as the campfire laps up
Golden flames, set against dying grey embers.

The firewood and late summer season
Must both reach their ends.
But goldenrod and fungi spores are
Wind-scattered,
Ready to begin again.
-st

What makes a camp fire glow?

The thrill of the wild
the dare of the dark
the acrid air

the crackle and spark
the chatter and laugh
the soothe of share

You’ll know when you’re there

Copyright: Kate Williams

Bios and Links

-Samantha Terrell,

author of Vision, and Other Things We Hide From (Potter’s Grove Press, 2021), is a widely published poet whose work emphasizes self-awareness as a means to social awareness. She has been featured on Sunny G Radio (Glasgow), The Open Collaboration (Bristol, U.K.), the Dublin-based “Eat the Storms” podcast, and the Creative Drive podcast (U.S.A.). She writes from her home in upstate New York.