perhaps a few hundredths

of an inch, and yet

the most--almost only--moisture

other than some heavy fog's

breath and dewy residues fallen

on this earth and her treasures

for, oh, a month or so.

And though the soft rain

wasn't much, still this

morning's early light has grown

golden by it and, perhaps tinged

in autumn's edge, so compell-

ing that we must gather up

our cameras as if rainbow's dropped

right into this web we're in

or here right up against

the ruddy side of the barn;

maybe at the upturned

roots of the old stump

along the liminal edge,

the threshold, where

path enters wood;

or there in the purple-

hued center of the garden

in its gilded frame

of black-eyed Susan.

Yes, these spots washed not

only in scant rainfall but

also by sweat of hard work

reflect gold at rainbow's end.

Where else after thirty years of labor

but in this very moment should one look?

It's in the green-gold magic

made by raindust and sun-

dew within these maple

leaves that soon enough Tom

could tap in their trunk,

distilling over slow flame

down doubts of drought,

ice-age doubt of absent God,

or indiscriminate wrathish hellfire.

By rainbow’s end this bubble sap

like the bent rays of washed light

gets cooked up in some sweet gold

Translated in this

poverty of language that

barely grasps at the miracle

of a seed’s transformation,

at the transcendence imbued

in such evanescent beauty

as sunwashed autumn over

tended earth treasures, all

this might be saying: "See.

There is too gold at this end

of rainbows."