Farewell To Summer

Ice mountain clouds then all intensities
of blue. The river is an archive of light:
cat's eyes, skitter of glass taws, wind-snagged swells
oily with fish-scale glitter. My breath stalls
as cormorants dive, bequeathing star trails.
A sundial heron unearths stones with
its probing toes. The flight of a tern, brave and
subtle beyond belief: a silent Mozart.
One last swim before I stand, mirror-skinned,
centering myself, till I no longer know
what I am looking at, and there is only
a cormorant high above the bridge,
heading off to where it needs to go,
to where it is being taken.