Autumn Anthems ?
 

Fall Leaves

The brighter they are
the faster they fail.

The higher they are
the farther they fall.

The fewer they are
the faster they fall.

The darker they are
the fiercer they flame.

This Time of Year

Fall leaves. Frost comes.
The Road Not Taken's traffic hums.

Exactly so, Julie,

What’s a fall without a Frost,
his road to take when we are lost?

And

When frost is on the pumpkin
the kin of pump are ripenin’.

&

When frost is on the punkin
the kin of pun are punnin'.

Leaves falling
are appalling.
I can't muster
cheer for bluster.
Birds depart,
it breaks my heart.
Summer ceases,
joy decreases.
Daylight shrinks.
Autumn stinks.

The Conspiracy: Illuminati Illumination

This one is true that Keats let fall:
The reason Sol has gone AWAL
Is he conspired with Autumn, yes!
If just to offer sunlight less;
Both are successful in their mission,
And form with clouds a coalition.

Mr. Killjoy

I have to hear such high-flown praise for Autumn,
Heights on heights pile to lengthen my rock-bottom.
d

Rogerbob -
night shrinks? Distance tells.
On this side of the pond,
it swells.

These are not entries for Lucy I take it.

Oops! My bad.

No, they're not in the style of anyone famous. Yet.

Stein Stutter

A leaf is a leaf is a leaf
of a tree of a tree of a tree
where there is no there.

Final Plea

The trees are gold,
the birds have left,
the air grows cold
and I bereft.

The night consumes
the shrinking day.
Darkness looms.
Please, summer, stay!

Tree at My Window

(after Frost, of course)

Tree at my window, window tree,
you always share your leaves with me.
I watch your leaves bud every spring,
limbs of leaves soon burgeoning.

And when the school bells ring and call,
I know your frosted leaves will fall,
your year in time with outer weather
attuned to my fall inner weather.

We'll Be Running
 

We'll Be Running

My calendar says it is autumn.
But the trees aren't turning,
The leaves aren't falling,
It's too damn hot to go hunting.

Like my lazy dog I'm dreaming;
Those red and yellow hills,
And twilight whippoorwills;
A harvest moon reborn,
My hunter's haunting horn.

She whimpers in her sleep,
I smile and scratch her ears;
Don't fret old girl, it won't be long,
Raccoons will raid the Indian corn;
Autumn will come, and we'll be running.


Along the Osage, I'm hoping.

Seasonally

Fall’s denuded
Winter’s shrouded

Spring’s reseeded
Summer’s repleted

It’s the season of tricks and of treats,
And in Autumn, my poet’s heart beats
With desire to write
A great ode … but, oh shite!
It’s already been done by old Keats.

.....***********************

When there’s colds to be caught, I have caught ’em,
And the flu has me feeling post-mortem.
Freezing rain, wind and fog
Make me sick as a dog …
That’s just Summer; it’s worse in the Autumn.

Everyone has turned their clocks back,
but I can't seem to fathom this watch.
So here I am stuck in Summer
with timekeeping a bit of a botch.

Rebooted
 

Fall Light

With every shortened day
the lovely leaves take flight
but bare trees increase light
that plays as branches sway.

Migration


The Valley gets a little rain,
to wet the palm trees and the taquerias.
The winter flocks are here again,
the Winter Texans. They are glad to see us.

Fruition. I eschew the race
to beat the creatures who would steal
the makings of an easy meal.
Instead I give them living-space
and hope thereby to gain in grace.
For I have fruit and they have not
so I will share my garden plot
with all small things that come to glean
the secret spaces in between
the softness and the whiff of rot.

I enjoy whatever you post, Ann, be it in poetry or prose. This one too.

Thank you, John.

Autumn

When leaves fall
my spirits rise.
(That isn't true
but sounded wise.)

Mother, Summer, I
by Philip Larkin

My mother, who hates thunderstorms,
Holds up each summer day and shakes
It out suspiciously, lest swarms
Of grape-dark clouds are lurking there;
But when August weather breaks
And rains begin, and brittle frost
Sharpens the bird-abandoned air,
Her worried summer look is lost.

And I her son, though summer-born
And summer-loving, none the less
Am easier when the leaves are gone;
Too often summer days appear
Emblems of perfect happiness
I can't confront: I must await
A time less bold, less rich, less clear:
An autumn more appropriate.

Autumn is icumen in

Autumn is icumen in
Lhude sing twittwu
Shrinkeþ sed
and dieþ med
and fallþ þe wde nu
Sing twittwu

Bereavements

When fall winds tear and twist sere leaves,
those falling leaves leave trees bereft.
Summer plumps up fleshy leaves
too soon transformed to severed leaves
falling like tears. The shriveled leaves
are drained of green and gold. Bereft.
When fall winds tear and scatter leaves,
those fallen leaves leave me bereft.

It is the autumn of the year,
The geese above are southward flying;
Election day is drawing near,
And politicians still are lying.

Douglas, ain’t it the truth!?


Acquainted with the Kite

after Frost, Schulz, Charlie Brown and Dante

I have been one acquainted with the kite.
I have exposed it to the wind and rain.
I have released my kite to errant flight.

I have relaxed fall flights near Lovers’ Lane.
I let it swoop near Lucy on our street
And looked away, expecting she’d complain.

It had annoyed some birds, who sang Defeat!
But I heard Marcie’s sigh and Snoopy’s cry.
And Pigpen’s: Do it, Chaz. Don’t get beat.

Make your gnarly marks up in the sky.
I let my paper kite rise out of sight
When Franklin shouted: Charlie, fly it high—

Kite-Eating Trees will always bite for spite!
I have been one acquainted with the kite.

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poe...acquainted-wit


(Aside: That stilted column of I’s, and its repetitions elsewhere, along with all those end-stopped lines, make me suspect Frost isn’t crazy about N’s overly formalized egocentricity—as in, “Who in hell hasn’t been acquainted with the night!” Plus that evasive “time was neither wrong nor right”! Closing a neat, if not vicious, circle, arc-welded by the echoing rhymes of start and finish. I don’t buy that Frost himself was much depressed, but rather clever, as usual, in a roundabout way.)

The deep red leaves that sing of fall,
September’s highs, October’s fling,
lead me to scribble endless scrawl,
as banal as the writes of spring.

I live for the day
when the sunshine stops
the sky turns gray
and the temperature drops

because Louisiana summer
is a bummer.