Monday, October 19, 2020

Deep-into-October Tableau or October on a Blue-gray Afternoon

 

Written in honour of this brooding, blue-gray deep-into-October afternoon







The garden has yielded its final gem 
The tree relinquishes its diadem 
The field is shorn where corn and barley gleamed 
Like gold and silver lakes as sunshine streamed 
Through a flue, gold and blue to mist-kissed piers 
The lily-dappled mead has shed its tears 
And summer like a picnic counterpane 
Is shaken out and folded up again 

The flower wonderland I dearly prized 
Where I would linger, petal-mesmerized 
Is stark and still, its thrill of grandeur spent 
Reminding me that all we have is lent 
The decanter of warmer days is drained 
The cricket melody gradually waned 
Until even the scattered cadence thinned 
And all I hear now is the brooding wind 

The chubby junco bobs among the leaves 
Quite unaware that these are autumn’s sheaves 
I wander without reason through bloom's wake 
How can such sweetness rouse such a raw ache 
Where fallow turns to furrow ‘neath the plow 
Where all we ever have is here and now 
Where we are torn between sorrow and awe 
Where earth seems so at peace with Nature’s Law 

October on a blue-gray afternoon 
Is like a bit of heaven gone too soon 
Each tree crowned in a halo, russet-bronze 
That drips and slips until the big sky yawns 
Through branches stark-naked and bold 
Etched in gnarled splendor for all to behold 
And a rush, sort of like a sudden sea 
Surges through us in spellbound sympathy 

I take my tea outside to watch the show 
The slow unraveling of red-yellow 
While dusk drops deep blue tints above yon hill 
A hint of woodsmoke wafts upon the chill 
And I am fully glad and sad at once 
Where October is a flickering sconce 
Set like a centerpiece on a buffet 
Of colour turning burnished brown and gray 

© Janet Martin 






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I hope you enjoyed your pause on this porch and thank-you for your visit!