With Autumn a few days away some leaves are already display: the mottled colors of death. Thin skin of plants shutters. Spiders continue spinning their cunning webs. The creek's voices are subdued, as it hasn't rained in weeks. Even the Wailing Wall is dry. The tiny anchorites who populate its caves have gone deep inside themselves, where they envision an alternative world.

Everyone enters these woods for their own reasons. Lovers with entwined fingers, whispering to each other. Young marrieds with infants riding in backpacks, their dogs disappearing behind bushes. Runners risking a fall on the rocky path ahead.

Like a songbird singing, the poet listens; then writes what will not be easily heard.