When the human skeleton displays appear
Arms outstretched as if alive
October trees show off their reds and yellows
Drawing back in their precious green
Dead leaves falling nipped by cold
Drifting off like early snow
Leaving the trees stripped bare
Revealing their skeletal structure
The human skeletons are dead of course
And most certainly do not come back to life
And never were alive to be precise
Being outsize plastic replicas
But the trees can and will do it
After standing naked and exposed all winter
Enduring the freezing cold
That would be the death of me
I could do without these skeleton displays
Larger than life as big as dinosaurs
As if to presage human extinction
But the trees in silhouette are whispering
I was here before you were born
I will be here after you are gone
Continuing to grow year after year
In my almost imperceptible way
