Sarah B. Cahalan

Our silhouettes get longer as we walk

the path from school each autumn afternoon.

We chat. We observe the foreground strewn

with green acorns, leaf litter, empty milk

cartons: skinny shadows stretching back

into the schoolward distance. I carry

your black-walnut-laden knapsack.

In the morning everything is hurry.

But after school, some days, we can linger;

look for bats and cats, anticipating

the multiplying cast of decorations —

gourds, Snoopies, but mostly bony fingers,

skulls. As night falls, shadows disappear.

The skeletons get larger every year.