New England Diary

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'Holding on'

"Chestnuts fell in the charred season,

Fell finally, finding room

In air to open their old cases

So they gleam out from the gold leaves,

In the dusk now, where they dropped down.

 

I go watch them, waiting for winter,

Their husks open and holding on.

Those rusted rims are rigid=hard

And cling clean to the clear brown...''

 

-- From "Another Reluctance,'' by Maine-based poet Annie Finch