Yellowing

A poem reflecting on the looming season ahead and the brilliance of the poet who inspired at the last inauguration

The other day, a friend of mine had mentioned that the fall colours here in Manitoba didn’t include much red. A few days later, I was out walking and got thinking about her comment.

My mind drifted, I don’t know why, to how I had done a talk about poetry back in the summer and included part of Amanda Gorman’s poem “The Hill We Climb” that she had recited at the Presidential inauguration in January 20, 2021. Definitely go watch it.

Photo by Matthew Ball on Unsplash

Somehow, my brain connected the yellow of the autumn leaves and the yellow of Gorman’s jacket that she wore that day. I wrote a bit of a reflection about these two things, and then suddenly thought - “I think this might be a poem.” Honestly, that never happens to me. I tend to not write poetry though I’ve come to appreciate it.

But, I’m trying to follow creative nudges when they happen, and so, here is my poem…

“Yellowing”

A friend mentioned how she missed the multitude of red leaves 
From when she lived in Toronto. 
You see, most all of our leaves here are yellow. 
Yellow leaves on fairly short trees. 
Sure, the silver birch are beautiful in their own way, 
But autumn doesn’t quite pop as much here as elsewhere,
Even if every now and then
Leaves dance against striking blue skies that seem to stretch beyond 
The confines of possibility.

The yellowing signals colder days ahead. 
Snow will come. 
It already hit Calgary, 
But we know that they get their reprieves throughout the winter. 
As we cling to slightly more temperate weather 
We anticipate our deep freeze setting in. 
November, 
then December, 
then January 
with its guarantees of minus forty, 
and that’s before the windchill. 
I will make my favourite quip about minus forty being the same whether it’s Celsius or Fahrenheit. 

Then we’ve still got February and March. 
And we begin praying 
to see signs of spring all the while knowing that its usually well into 
April before we get there
and there’s still likely a major snowfall to come
That will add to the piles 
and 
piles 
and 
piles.

Today we sit in the yellows of late fall. 
The grey month looms
Where moods shift, 
And we become more somber. 
Or maybe its happening earlier this year. 

Kids are dressing up for trick or treat, 
and diligent parents make sure they can fit winter parkas under Spiderman costumes. 
We wish we were kids too. 
That we could race around in masks 
pretending not to be scared, 
hoping to accumulate mounds of morsels to consume 
that we know aren't good for us. 

Maybe that’s still us.
We feel the yellow. 
Yellow-bellied.
We feel the way my friend feels about there being less pops of gorgeous reds. 
The wind chills from the pole in the north
Anxiety blows from polls in the south.

There's no vibrancy of the greens, 
Just yellow and now almost brown and shrivelling on the ground, 
Waiting for the inevitable pile
That must be shovelled through once again. 

Our leaves here are mostly yellow.
Dull. Like an ache. 
The change starts slowly, 
and then fall,
and then winter arrives like a knife in the heart. 
Yes, we can look forward to Christmas, 
But our playbook is running out 
of silver linings these days.

On a walk I remember another something yellow: striking, bold. 
A young African-American women stood on a stage in January.
Her coat like the sun ablaze, almost too bright to behold, 
A yellow not of decay 
But of incandescent life borne to all touched by her beams.
Not there for fashion statements, but poetry.
And her words lit up a continent.

How could we not be drawn to a then 22-year-old Amanda Gorman 
reading her own words at the presidential inauguration?
Drawn to what she said and how she said it, and just to her, 
A remarkable human being that stood 
on that platform 
on that day 
and proclaimed those words, 
Words so personal to her 
And yet resonant for so many
Even for us north of the border.

I think of myself at 22, how different I was from her. 
A man, white, almost 6 foot 4, 
No clue about the power of language to hurt or to heal 
And yet so confident in myself and who I was, 
At least that’s the mask I’d learned to wear.

I re-watch Gorman’s recitation.
Her words both cut and mend.
How does she do that? 
I’m not envious, I genuinely wonder.
I want to learn from this young master of language. 
I want others to hear and heed her. 
I want to be able to write even half as well as what she brings in this single effort.

But, more than this I want the all the yellowing to stop 
being a sign of all that could pile up even higher 
come November, 
And instead have these withering and fallen leaves 
Somehow become harbingers of hope and healing.

---

Does any of this resonate for you?

What reflection might you have as November approaches?