We did not get the early season snowstorm,
so was it national news or overtime envy
that pushed Public Works to be out
in their front-end loaders and dump trucks
to pick up leaves, piles and piles of them—
oak, maple, elm, and ash—along the boulevards,
heavy equipment at the ready
to round them up, hoist them high,
fill twenty-five ton 18-wheelers to the brim,
haul them off into bigger piles somewhere secret,
to wait for a big wind to gather them up again,
blow them back home.
New England Memories 