Chestnuts fell in the charred season,
fell finally, finding room
in air to open their old cases
so they gleam out from the gold leaves
in dust now, where they dropped down.

I watch them, waiting for winter,
husks open and holding on.
Their rusted rims are rigid-hard
but cling soft to the clear brown.
This low light sinks soon

from the old tree in the only sun,
from the gifts that have fallen. Cold children’s
chestnuts, hidden in small caches,
have gone hollow, with gleams gone,
grain gone, now the children are home.

First collected in Eve (Story Line Press, 1997, Reprinted by Carnegie Mellon University Press Contemporary Classics Poetry Series, 2011)