sonnet: on his blindness to autumn

i too consider how my days are spent 
and fret but little when like autumn’s bright
orange maples they fade and fall, my sight
is good enough to burn those maples, scent 

and color, on my brain so deep a thousand
sonnets ought to issue forth unbid 
but my shy talent has only life to hide 
itself so deep in folds that i can drowse 

eye-deep in shades of orange from yesterday,
i wind again with wife and friends the Squaw
Peak Road and test our oohs against their aahs
around each hairpin turn as autumn plays 

its brightest prelude to winter and death
we gasp and know again the life of breath