Dave Bonta's "Rubaiyat" begins on a cool September morning and turns into a kind of toast to autumn. The speaker looks at a foggy forest and asks it, almost like a prayer, for its gifts: frost, and a fallen apple that sits perfectly in the hand. Biting into it, the speaker finds it "bites back," and that sharpness becomes the poem's real subject. Sweetness alone isn't enough; the speaker wants some tartness, a wine that's "dry," a love that is "impure."
The last stanza shifts from apples to wine. The cloudy "must" settles week by week, the fog clears, and the bottle ends up "brim[ming] with light." The poem suggests that time and patience turn rough, murky things into something clear and glowing.
The mood is warm, appreciative, and a little playful. The speaker isn't mourning the end of summer. They're relishing autumn's bite, and the imperfections that make life, and love, taste real.