Like a gladiator, the late
September sun returns
a little more battered each morning,
bestowing
a little less warmth
and a little more color.
But which spectator among us pauses
to consider—each time
our own voice rises
in anger, lowers again
in despair—how many Olympians
are summoned and spent,
how many golden days
ransacked, rarest hours
blitzed from the air—how much summer
do we really think we have left?
