“Inside of us, there’s a continual autumn.
Our leaves fall and are blown out over the water.”
Rumi
Autumn
All posts tagged Autumn
“Delicious autumn!
My very soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird
I would fly about the earth seeking the successive autumns.”
— George Eliot
“Life starts all over again when it gets crisp in the fall.”
F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
Love’s Gleaning Tide
by William Morris
Draw not away thy hands, my love,
With wind alone the branches move,
And though the leaves be scant above
The Autumn shall not shame us.
Say; Let the world wax cold and drear,
What is the worst of all the year
But life, and what can hurt us, dear,
Or death, and who shall blame us?
Ah, when the summer comes again
How shall we say, we sowed in vain?
The root was joy, the stem was pain
The ear a nameless blending.
The root is dead and gone, my love,
The stem’s a rod our truth to prove;
The ear is stored for nought to move
Till heaven and earth have ending.
Autumn Butterfly
Pablo Neruda
The butterfly dances
and burns – with the sun – sometimes,
flits and flies flaring in a swirl,
now still,
on a leaf that rocks it.
They said, “You have nothing.
Not this sickness. You persist.”
I said nothing either.
And it is past the hour of the harvest.
Today a hand of anguish
filled the autumn sky.
And into my soul the fall leaves pushed.
They said, “You have nothing.
Not this sickness. You persist.”
It was the hour of the scythe.
The sun, now,
convalesced.
Everything leaves this life, my friends.
It leaves or perishes.
It leaves the hand that beckons.
It leaves or perishes.
It leaves the rose you loosen.
And the mouth that gives you a kiss.
Water, shadow and vase.
It leaves or perishes.
It is past the hour of the scythe.
The sun, now, convalesced.
Its warm tongue enveloped me.
And then I said: “-You persist.”
The butterfly dances,
shudders,
disappears.
“Autumn. It’s crispness, it’s anticipation, it’s melancholia, it’s cool breezes replacing summer’s heat. It’s long days in the field, a harvest festival when work’s done, a cheering crowd in a football stadium, chrysanthemums punctuating a somber landscape. It’s Halloween high-jinx, pumpkins grinning toothy smiles, the crack of pecan pressed against pecan. It’s the first curls of woodsmoke, fresh blisters from pushing a rake. It’s crisp and fresh and mellow and snug, solemn and melancholy. And it’s very, very welcome.” Author: Good Housekeeping Magazine
Leaves
Elsie N. Brady
“How silently they tumble down
And come to rest upon the ground
To lay a carpet, rich and rare,
Beneath the trees without a care,
Content to sleep, their work well done,
Colors gleaming in the sun.
At other times, they wildly fly
Until they nearly reach the sky.
Twisting, turning through the air
Till all the trees stand stark and bare.
Exhausted, drop to earth below
To wait, like children, for the snow.”
September Hartley Coleridge The dark green Summer, with its massive hues, Fades into Autumn's tincture manifold. A gorgeous garniture of fire and gold The high slope of the ferny hill indues. The mists of morn in slumbering layers diffuse O'er glimmering rock, smooth lake, and spiked array Of hedge-row thorns, a unity of grey. All things appear their tangible form to lose In ghostly vastness. But anon the gloom Melts, as the Sun puts off his muddy veil; And now the birds their twittering songs resume, All Summer silent in the leafy dale. In Spring they piped of love on every tree, But now they sing the song of memory.
“Try to remember the kind of September
When life was slow and oh, so mellow
Try to remember the kind of September
When grass was green and grain was yellow
Try to remember the kind of September
When you were a tender and callow fellow
Try to remember, and if you remember
Then follow”
To the River
Edgar Allan Poe
Fair river! in thy bright, clear flow
Of crystal, wandering water,
Thou art an emblem of the glow
Of beauty- the unhidden heart-
The playful maziness of art
In old Alberto’s daughter;
But when within thy wave she looks-
Which glistens then, and trembles-
Why, then, the prettiest of brooks
Her worshipper resembles;
For in his heart, as in thy stream,
Her image deeply lies-
His heart which trembles at the beam
Of her soul-searching eyes.
Maverick Mist 