September is a good time to draw
your breath and draft the next episode,
to sketch fall and winter plans –
those days of tumult when children and parents,
sisters and brothers, nieces, nephews, friends and lovers
collect in close quarters for good cheer and bad gossip,
for high praise and low blows – the way family is wont to do.
Seldom do Thanksgiving and Christmas pan out the way we draft them,
but always someone acts up, or plays the fool, or drives into a creek,
or, for crying out loud, the damn tree tips over.
Dave Read