20151029 (fall)

A week ago we had some snain*

The restaurants are chaining down

Their alfresco-ware for the season

Perhaps they have no basements to

Store the summer goods they can’t

Pull up the sidewalk fencing which

Would help when the shovels come 

Out my trees two in front several

In the back yard are losing leaves

I rake the front distribute it as mulch

To keep the weeds down in the

Streetside uncultivated beds the 

Back yard gets raked when all 

Have fallen hopefully before the 

Snow I’ll take bags of them to

The neighborhood gardens a block

West I had a shredder a large

Barrel composter a colleague 

Bequeathed stifling a sigh of 

Relief that he had dumped the 

Two too much maintenance so

Little product for the effort

I think I spent more time 

Unjamming the machine than

Actually shredding honing the

Blade was a Saturday morning

In itself Heights spec’d a day

To suck up your leaves if you’d

Raked them into a neat heap

Oxymoron if ever there was one

I always missed the day but they

Collected bagged leaves and they

Do here too seems like a waste to

Let trees suck the nutrients out of

The ground only to have collectors

Truck them away composting is

One of those admirable green 

Alternatives I wouldn’t sit there

With a pair of scissors hacking

Individual leaves to compostable

Bits on my grounds but using

Fuel to cart them off to some

Central composting center adds

To the problem because good 

Composting releases methane an

Even more powerful greenhouse 

Gas than carbon dioxide damned

If you do damned if you don’t

But you can burn methane rather

Than gasoline or coal and end 

Up saving a bit of Mother Earth

But for that you’ll need a digester

And a lot of process piping at no

Mean expense your neighbors

Will not envy you bringing industry

To the block what did the forests

Do before we came with all our

Green folderol don’t get me wrong

I’m among the worst of tree-huggers

But between having a lawn to feed

Manicure tend and then dispose of

With a clean conscience nature’s got

Us in a bag cabin life is starting to 

Look really good except for the

Bugs in the summertime which

We may have to eat

c.J.S.Manista, 2015

*snow, rain