The knife-edged air cuts through the day,

                        and severs leaves from trees.

A seeming blizzard descends, fluttering, rising on a gust,

            like dying, golden butterflies.

The red-tinged, careless scattering of yellow leaves

            looks like a carpet by Monet -- no even strokes,

                        but splashes that the eye blends into

            a shimmering impression of a perfect autumn day.

How like the awful beauty of the phoenix fall appears --

            all dying in a blaze,

the flaming red and yellow washing over trees,

            leaving them bare, soon to be covered by

            a gentle, death-like cloak of ash-white snow,

then soon again, to be reborn, as the wheel spins,

            and we go on and on, and sink, to rise again.