On “Autumn Leaves”, Oil on Canvas, 1856, by John Everett Millais.
Four women in the field.
Three young women and a little girl.
Late afternoon, trying to accomplish her job,
gathering a pile of leaves to make a bonfire
and, then, like vestals of modern times,
they will be offering it to the sky;
more than odor of burning leaves,
incense from departing summer.
Executors and witnesses to the seasons’ changes,
to which, inebitably, all of us are chained.
The two eldest feed the funeral pile,
properly dressed in dark clothes, while the youngest,
indifferent and incomprehensible to the moment,
feeds herself.
The land will become bare and virgin,
sanctified and prepared for the miracle of spring.
In the background, the sun that gilded the day,
prepares itself for the retreat:
will make its journey to brothers beyond horizons,
remaining, however, its promise, never broken,
of eternal and daily reborn.
Published in The Lake, November 2020 issue
http://www.thelakepoetry.co.uk
Published in The Ekphrastic Review, Jan 11 2022
This poem and all others at this blog, authored by Edilson Afonso Ferreira ©
edilsonmeloferreira 