Sunset birches

Sunset birches,
falling leaves,
cast broken shadows
over the old man and me,

the weathered fellow and I,
coupled by a park bench near a pond,
were calling out the future,
sharing dreams.

It wasn't until the frogs began chattering
that we had too,
(its always too hard for me to sit quietly when everyone else is talking)
so I had spoken first,
startled that the old guy
wasn"t drunk,
(there was after all that brown wrapper sticking from his pocket)

"Even a frog in a mud puddle has dreams"
he said.

I sat silently for awhile,
then his eyes said goodbye.

I wondered afterward,
what frogs dream about,
and realized
that if under all that mud
their dreams were nightmares
about giant dragonflies
and sinking lily pads,
they probably would chatter a lot
in order to avoid seeing the fallen leaves floating by,
and eat every dragon fly they saw...