Ode to October (literally and metaphorically)

 

When season-end baskets and bowls

Cradle final gleaning that tolls

With future gardens gathered in...

When garden gourds are gathered in

When woodland awning starts to thin

When Jack Frost takes a predawn stroll

Across each frond, pond, nook and knoll

When landscapes start to don the hues

Of purple, umber, bronze and blues

When nature is like a lodestone

Drawing us from work to be done

When the wind’s kiss pinches and nips

Ears, noses, chins, and fingertips

And sunrise skies are stark and sheer

We know October’s end is near

When like a gush of waterfalls

Hearts bear a rush of madrigals

That beg for brushes, ink and page

And yet no artwork can assuage

The bittersweetness of the sense

Of bare feet shod with recompense

Driving the wearer of dues wild

With whispers of Forever’s Child

Because for all that time does steal

It leaves behind the kind appeal

Of happiness’s eager joy

Akin to a hungry schoolboy

When a brisk broom nobody sees

Chases a brood of laughing leaves

Across the stubble-stippled lea

Of summer’s silenced symphony

When apple orchards don the pall

Of Bygone’s quiet, hallowed hall

Where voices danced, drifted and rang

As pickers bantered, jived and sang

When market stands are heaped with fare

That busy, calloused hands put there

When harvest-bustle dwindles down

Turning earth into a ghost-town

When rustle-fell and footsteps merge

When want and wonder taunt and surge

When echoes stir the settled dust

Of pretty, petalled wanderlust

When joy and sorrow intertwine

Like buds betrayed by brittle vine

When golden tapers start to dim

To labyrinths of darkened limb

And front porch lights dapple the dusk

Like warm welcomes against the brusque

And brooding, lowering of eves

Awash with rain and wind-tossed leaves

When little cakes and cups of tea

Adapt an ache of luxury

And books, like patient, paper friends

Wait, where winter will make amends

When season-end baskets and bowls

Cradle final gleaning that tolls

With future gardens gathered in

To box, or bag, or crocks, or tin

As jar upon jar testifies

Of Bounty’s mercy-laden prize

And gold and green turns bare and brown

As Autumn lays its glory down

When pots simmer with supper soup

And contentment is like a troop

Of hungry helpers warmed and fed

With soup and cheese and fresh baked bread

When The Poet wrangles to rhyme

A very precious sense of time

...we ought to take to touch and taste

What none can keep yet none can haste

But simply treasure as it rolls

Like sea-song across hearts and souls

To listen to its lyrics played

Before its notes of color fade

When Mother Nature claps her hands

With final no-nonsense demands

We know October’s end is near

Ah, time enough to shed a tear

After the pangs of what must be

Become pictures in poetry

After the hatches of the land

Are battened down by a firm hand

Tucking the town and country lane

Beneath a downy counterpane

When hearths flicker, crackle and grin

While winter softly closes in

When, with the turning of the sod

We trust the providence of God

Who cups the crux of season-strains

In law and order He maintains

In the beauty that He designs

In the goodness that He refines

In the perfection of the plan

Above the ways and wiles of man

Then, with the deaths that Autumn brings

We do not fret the Yet of things

Because the Love that tolls time’s bell

Instills hello in each farewell

The appetite of hungry clocks 

Insists we put on shoes and socks

Insists we turn the other cheek

For rebel-rousing rogues to tweak

Insists we yield; futile to fight

The fortitude of day and night

Insists we learn how to let go

Of No Returns that we love so

Insists on pressing crease by crease

The telltale signs of Autumn's Lease

Insists on teaching us to dress

Our naked wants with thankfulness  

© Janet Martin

When apple orchards don the pall

Of Bygone’s quiet, hallowed hall..