The Morning After (Poetry)

The garden shrinks from sharp-eyed sun,
squinting, keen to count the cost,
as trees stand solemn, heavy-limbed,
hung-over, aching, blanched by frost.

For Autumn had a party here -
she held one wild and final fling,
leftovers tossed by loutish winds
that gatecrashed her last gathering.

Now roses lay their fragile heads,
bruised and tired, against the hedge,
avoid the thin and unkind light
reminding that it's time to shed

their party wear - all colour bleeds
and turns the world to monochrome -
the glamour and the glory gone
to Mother Earth, who summons home

her children - heaped in crumpled beds
where morning finds the hangers-on
out cold, and diamanté death
declares their dancing days are done.