sichuan autumn's eve

Sheaves of rice stalks
leaned together on field’s edges –
one muddy road led me
to where Autumn was;
this grey sky has still not shed
all the rain it will
(and I wait for it to).
Sparkles of water bedew
my skin (still not rain).
So I push on through Autumn’s
reticent pictures,
peopled by back-bent folk
feet bare in mud.
Their tiny talk wavers
crawling up the huge
silence, their bamboo groves
hang tresses over the road
dripping with midnight
in daytime. I push on,
ghost doomed not to stop:
come dusk
these sheaves will twitch
and dance,
flared big bodies will sway
and accidental heads will nod,
freed of the daytime charade
of an Autumn silent
and unenchanted.

All the festivals have died
And all the folk crouch in TV light
come night, still, rapt, empaled.
Beyond the TV spell
these sheaves will move.