November...a parody in response to the poem September

Poetic Bloomings invites us to attempt a Parody: Simply put, a parody poem is one that pokes fun at another poem or poet. It could “mock” a song lyric (which is basically musical poetry). It can draw inspiration to answer another work. Everything is fair game; the more irreverent, the funnier (or more pointed) it will be.

Mine is really just a response to the poem September by: Helen Hunt Jackson (it always bothered me that she did not share her 'secret' about that day. So, I am sharing November's secret.

The golden rod is brown now

The corn is in its bin

The trees in apple orchards

Are stripped of rosy grin

The gentians bluest fringes

Are shriveled, brittle fray

In broken pods the milkweed

Has flung its silk away

The sedges spill their harvest

In stilted meadow-nook

And asters by the brook-side

Have dropped into the brook

From frosted lanes of morning

The children’s breath-clouds rise

The ditch is all a-flutter

With birch-leaf butter-flies

By all these gilded tokens

November days are here

With autumn’s dismal weather

And autumn’s sullen tear

But none of this gray tinting

Which makes November drear

Can dim November’s hinting

Of Christmas drawing near

And I will share my secret

Of dull November’s guile

For soon it will be Christmas

And that is why I smile

© Janet Martin

September

by Helen Hunt Jackson

  THE golden-rod is yellow;
        The corn is turning brown;
    The trees in apple orchards
        With fruit are bending down.

    The gentian's bluest fringes
        Are curling in the sun;
    In dusty pods the milkweed
        Its hidden silk has spun.

    The sedges flaunt their harvest,
        In every meadow nook;
    And asters by the brook-side
        Make asters in the brook,

    From dewy lanes at morning
        The grapes' sweet odors rise;
    At noon the roads all flutter
        With yellow butterflies.

    By all these lovely tokens
        September days are here,
    With summer's best of weather,
        And autumn's best of cheer.

    But none of all this beauty
        Which floods the earth and air
    Is unto me the secret
        Which makes September fair.

    'T is a thing which I remember;
        To name it thrills me yet:
    One day of one September
        I never can forget.