Reply to the Question: "How can You Become a Poet? - Eve Merriam

take the leaf of a tree
trace its exact shape

the outside edges
and inner lines
memorize the way it is fastened to the twig

(and how the twig arches from the branch)

how it springs forth in April
how it is panoplied in July

by late August
crumple it in your hand
so that you smell its end-of-summer sadness

chew its woody stem
listen to its autumn rattle

watch it as it atomizes in the November air

then in winter
when there is no leaf left

invent one