Let’s Get on With It

Exactly one marcescent leaf
Has made it through the winter whole
On the old tree trucks rattle past.

It’s like a last flake of dead skin
To be shed from a long-healed scar,
That last fleck of old nail polish,

The last yellow tip of dyed hair,
Anything like that, anything
About to be pushed out by growth,

Any crumpled ugly old scrap
That achieves a little pathos
In the eye of the beholder

Simply for being singular,
For hanging on long past its time,
But you’ll still appreciate spring.