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October

By Jacob Polley b. 1975 Jacob Polley

Although a tide turns in the trees

the moon doesn't turn the leaves,

though chimneys smoke and blue concedes

to bluer home-time dark.

Though restless leaves submerge the park

in yellow shallows, ankle-deep,

and through each tree the moon shows, halved

or quartered or complete,

the moon's no fruit and has no seed,

and turns no tide of leaves on paths

that still persist but do not lead

where they did before dark.

Although the moonstruck pond stares hard

the moon looks elsewhere. Manholes breathe.

Each mind's a different, distant world

this same moon will not leave.

Source: Poetry (September 2006).

Biography

Jacob Polley was born in Carlisle, Cumbria, in 1975. He is the author of three collections of poetry, The Brink (2003), Little Gods (2006), and The Havocs (2012). His novel, Talk of the Town (2009), won the Somerset Maugham Award. He lives in Fife, Scotland and teaches at the University of St. Andrews.

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