Summer's Last Hurrah

Uncertain the Final Run to Winter
                      -William Kloefkorn
Summer,
a fat horse
tender against the spurs

Now as the last edge of autumn
hangs precipiced in yellow on the trees
the animal sees the sudden space and shies.
I sense the ropy girth go loose:
uncertain the final run to winter.

Between the halt and the beginning
lies the gap,
familiar to the eye
as palm to pommel.

My lean horse balks:     ahead,
the wide white skylessness of space.

Not knowing where mount and rider end,
or where they come together,
I see myself as statue weathered,
sitting its saddle like an Ichabod.