1. Sombrero

September begins
and the weather is like this:
tense
with a strong chance of hurricane
by week's end;
the kids are scattered in three directions
for the first day of school;
the temperature
will reach the high 90s;
and the leaves are turning
orange,
red
and
yellow.

I'm collecting images in my
head
that
I wish I had photographed
instead.

This morning it was this hazy valley
with silhouettes of rounded
blue mountains as a backdrop, 

a bend in the railroad tracks lit
by slanted rays of the rising sun,

and then a homemade traffic sign
warning of turtles
crossing
along the next seven miles of road.

But there was no time to stop.
There never is.

A cat sitting bolt-upright
near a cut in a grassy field,
staring down,
waiting.

The cat is orange,
and I've seen it in
that very spot
before doing
that very thing.

An ornate black sombrero
falls down
from somewhere and
comes to rest
up-ended
on the sidewalk.

No one rushes after it -
nothing else happens.

I don't know whether
to laugh at the
absurdity

or
fear the
consequences.