Gerry Cambridge assumes an arboreal spirit.

Maples, the central glory of the Fall in New England and Canada, also make their mark in Scotland. The piece is in Cambridge's volume, "Nothing But Heather!": Scottish Nature in Poems, Photographs and Prose (Luath Press, 1999).

FALLEN MAPLE LEAVES

Like jigsaw pieces to an unfound puzzle,

drawn up from where we lie now we were each

a bud that swayed on the blue and white,

then made all summer a submarine shade

with our rustling high society. Now we

are colours of blood and butter and bronze,

wind-shaken down from our lofty tree,

and not to be shamed by our last flamboyance

before we re-enter mud's democracy.