november poem

Autumn came on under a cold film of stars
thin as a calfsfoot jelly my grandmother made
and all the trees nodding into sallow ruin
shook their shaggy heads at me
the whole zodiac stamped and howled their names

but I am a four-limbed magnanimous idea
on a privet path the sun washes into marble
laughing at four winds and four thousand telephone cables
strung over the city like catgut guitars