As I cut the skinny branches of the smokebush

I hear a loud rattle in the sky. A black helicopter

descends lower, disappears. The noise carries

from the school playground at the end

of the block. I cut branches into small pieces, toss them

into the leaf bag with the rosebush clippings.

A woman walks by with her daughters,

tells me the helicopter med-vac’d someone,

deposited her –or him–with the EMTS.

I drag the last leaf bag to lean against the retaining wall.

Winter’s three weeks off, but the bare trees say

it’s started. All that’s left alive: the rosemary, hellebore, a lone red cabbage.

The solstice approaches, a fixed point in the middle distance.

Inside, the black night shows itself in tall kitchen windows.