Poetry Friday - Praising Autumn with #PoetryPals

Ruth Hersey  at There Is No Such Thing As A Godforsaken Town hosts this Poetry Friday after our Thanksgiving Day HERE. Hope everyone had the day they had planned. Small or large, it is a day to take some time to be grateful. Ruth lives in the country of Haiti, has written her daily November "Gratitu" and a lovely ode to autumn. It's a unique look from a country that holds few seasonal changes, but lately, some terrible political ones. Thank you, Ruth, for your heartfelt post.

       It is the end of the month, often the time for #PoetryPals to offer a challenge. You can read Tanita's explanation HERE, to write an ode to autumn. I did some research yet returned to advice from Billy Collins that Tanita shared. I just wrote about autumn a couple of weeks ago HERE, but that was a bit tongue-in-cheek for Ted Kooser. This time, I attempted to follow Billy's rules. Thanks for the challenge, #PoetryPals. Our leaves are all nearly down; trees are stark against the sky. But it means I can see more stars!

Wishing each of you a lovely beginning to December!

To Autumn

 

If I were to write an autumn ode,

list minute parts which I adore,

spring might cry “Foul! I've also glowed.”

And I’d reply, “Please, don’t be sore.

 

You’ll have a turn from Eliot’s reply

but now, I write of wealth in rainbows,

artists’ palettes drip down like sighs

as trees prepare their encore show.”

 

I praise the scene of autumn’s court,

sweater-snug under blue-bright sky,

a panoply of feuille morte*.    

It tells how best to say goodbye.

 

                                      Linda Baie © 

 

*(a brownish orange that is deeper and slightly redder than leather, yellower and deeper than spice, and yellower and deeper than gold pheasant. — called also autumn leaf, dead leaf, foliage brown, leather lake, oakleaf brown, philamot, withered leaf.)