The Ox in Autumn

The ox I love stands in depleted gold,
The piles of leaves like droppings from his body,
Only the hangings of blood left in the oak leaves,
All else, the great final defecation.
You may have your own cloacal image,
But all of us can admit when the scene
Goes it goes, and something like the dark ox
Remains—the stark, peering head uplifted.

I do not mean to accuse the ox or us
Of eating the glorious, framed, golden world
Like vandals munching paintings in a hall,
The gold-leaf flaking on neck and shoulders
As if an art destroyed struck out at us—
And yet the effect is about the same:
A set of teeth rips through the rich texture,
We the digesters with our visceral eyes.