Leaf Potatoes

It's an unusual November sky today

Nearly cloudless,

though out west

I see lurking some grey/white shadows.

They'll be here before sundown, I think.

The sky is easier to see now

For most of the leaves are gone from the trees.

They litter my lawn in a multicolored fiesta...

All shapes and sizes, like enormous confetti

Left after a windy revelry

For once they danced and swayed

In the wind's song.

Today, the wind is gentle,

Just enough breeze to barely ripple the water in my pond.

I watch as my kittens leap and crouch after a leaf skittering here and there.

They use their fore paws like the arms of an awkward child, trying to catch a ball.

II used to play with leaves, too,

Try to catch as many as I could on a windy day,

Or rake them for my Grandma.

She would have me rake them as best I could into a large pile at the curb.

Chicagoans could burn leaves in that long ago.

And Grandma, for a treat -

Would take foil covered potatoes

And place them at the bottom of the burning leaf pile.

When the leaves reduced to smokey ash,

She would gather them in her every present apron.

We would go into her kitchen

Sinking of smoke, noses pinched red by the cold air,

And out she'd bring butter and forks and knives and little plates.

The she and I would sit together

And eat those roasted, sometimes scorched, always delicious

"Leaf potatoes"...

A private feast for us two hard workers.

She saved some on the pilot light of her stove for supper.

And when grandpa would come home from work

And my aunt,

They would say the lawn looked nice,

And smile as Grandma would place a "leaf" potato on their dinner plates.

And all in all,

The memories evoked by falling leaves,

And burning leaves,

Smoke and mirrors, I think, looking at the pond, and the fallen leaves...

All these sights conjuring thoughts of a long ago time

And longing

For a long ago November afternoon.

By Karen A. Lech

Copyright 2009