To a journalist

It may not concern you how at this time of year autumn lingers on in various stages of undress. Then again it might. That the water dips, glides, flexes its sinews going down slope and hitting the bottom shatters into a hundred rainbows each having the life-span of a drop of water may not concern you. The trees have something impassive about them - admittedly: standing there drawing their nutrients up out of the soil - making their slow way up toward the sun: only once a year do they get new leaves only once a year they lose them: predictably - as you might say. The evergreens are probably even less ne5sworthy. Yet when we consider that what most of us want from the global power-struggle is a decent job and a little peace of mind - and perhaps those few vaguely sacred things only life offers - a chance to love, raise a family perhaps, to invent a new spark plug or a better linguistic method: when we consider that our overseas neighbor has a stomach just like ours; that his food comes from the ground; that his most persistent memories are nothing more indecent or glorious than one of his wife's kisses or an afternoon spent running in leaves with his children; if we could really learn to love this earth which nourishes us; if we could learn to behave lovably - perhaps entire populations would no longer be oppressed; army barracks might no longer go up in flames in the night; the woman who lives across the street from me with her three children would not have to wonder if her husband their father is dead or alive; we might no longer have to live with blood on our hands - and could invest our time somewhat more sanely than inventing ways to poison one another. Who knows? even the autumn might mean something to us.