In the Low Light of an October Eve

The dead stems of a summer's roses

still standing in the low light of an October

eve's fast falling, remind me

of the approaching reckoning we

all have x'd on the calendar:

when the words we cut from hedges

we never expected to see thin

become the winter's kindling

the impossibility of our scampering

over swinging gates in the April rush

to catch the june bugs flittering

about our princely heads

makes for a long brooding evening.

I've sipped, perhaps one too many,

sips of a highland moor's melancholy mead,

staring off into the dim

tragedy of my own castle's

crumbling shadows, the tower

block awaiting dawn,

the stretching of a neck,

listening to the dear ghosts of friends

shuffling up the steps--

this long brooding autumn night before me.

When she asks--what I am thinking,

if I'd rather be alone?--I stir from the dark

gloom of lethargy to turn on a light,

and reading the latest musings

of friends still flickering against

the calendar's incessant turning of leaves

I find my self, the still beating heart

of a hunger not yet filled--

and chase off the late October night's last brooding.

Ken e Bujold

© 2022

Reviews

[Neville]

You wield a mighty pen indeed sir as well as secateurs, I see & so very bloomin well .. May you long wield it Ken .. Another masterpiece from thee & most thoroughly enjoyed .. Neville :)

[Ken e Bujold]

i hope to Neville, though oct is my month for brooding dark poems

[Relic]

Wow, I don't believe I've read your poetry before but this really is impressive. I had the feeling of impending doom while reading and your replies confirmed it. Your metaphors are excellent.

I too, at the age of sixty, have lost many friends from the past and it doesn't add confidence to the years ahead. But living every day searching to fulfil goals is what keeps me going.

Great poem, my friend.

[Ken e Bujold]

thank you for the kindness of your review Relic. and I wholeheartedly agree with your view that living every day to the fullest is what keeps us going
stop by anytime

[Chris Shaw]

Your lines here certainly aren't full of the joys of spring Ken. Autumn does that to me. The dark nights, mornings and the dying garden, all reminders of a long winter ahead. I'm not sure whether you have had one too many or whether you should pour yourself another large one. The mood here inescapable.

Chris

[Ken e Bujold]

well Chris I find pouring the mood into a poem is better for the mind and liver than swallowing the contents of a bottle to settle the mood, if you know what I mean. So no, didn't get soused, but did have an extra one. As I suspect you are, I am reaching the age where a few too many of my life's comrades are missing. And days, when I sit and think of that, makes me aware of a few things, there is less in front of me than behind, and that metaphorically speaking thinking of them really is akin to hearing them stepping up to the tower block

[Chris Shaw]

Know what you mean. A neighbour of 40 years died a couple of weeks ago. It was unexpected and then it got me thinking about everyone else who'd gone to pastures new. My hangover days are well and truly gone. Can't handle too much, but I certainly pour myself a glass when I get maudling.There's not much good about aging in my opinion:)

[Ken e Bujold]

well a few things, at least over here. i get really good discounts at the drugstore, even on toothpaste. I can always count on a seat on the bus, cause I will point in need be to the gray and claim my priority seating. And three, best of all, I can pretend I don't hear whatever I don't wish to hear and chalk it up to being hard of hearing. so age does have its perks :)

[Chris Shaw]

Ha, ha. I like the one about pretending to be deaf. That sounds like fun :)

[John the Baptist]

Impermanence and death hang heavily over this one. Perhaps the speaker has sipped one too many, because the images of "the approaching reckoning" abound here. I think maybe the autumn season inclines us towards this kind of musing, especially if we have some decades under our belt. At a certain point in time, October comes to symbolize more than Halloween to us.

[Ken e Bujold]

indeed it does John. Whenever I read Eliot and April is the cruelest month, I am called to question, what he saw in it that made it harsher than the falling autumn October.

[W. Barrett Munn]

I'm with you, friend. Autumn is the suckiest of seasons. The creeping cold and the disappearing sun do not balance, leaving us in an unbalanced state of dread. Well put in words, Ken.

Winston

[Ken e Bujold]

thanks Winston. As I remarked to Fred, its not so much the cold I hate as the chill. And as I imagine you can relate to as well, when combined with the mounting losses, it can be a b***h of a season, bred for brooding

[Red Brick Keshner]

That hunger that has yet to be filled, that is what gets you all the time!
That brooding too has already begun. Thanks for sharing.

[Ken e Bujold]

it can Freds. I am not the greatest fan of autumn, I dislike the chill. Cold I can take, but the chill of autumn disagrees with my bones. Then on top of that I am now of the age where some, one might say a good deal too many of my life's compatriots are missing. Combine the two and you get a good night's brooding, especially if you mix some scotch in there as well. Thankfully my dear Musica has an innate sense of when her brooding poet is perhaps a bit too close to the pits of hell.

Ken

[Red Brick Keshner]

I concur Ken. Perhaps this internet poetry thing is diversion enough for the gap that has formed in our offline life. And much life the amalgam to fill the caverns of missing tooth parts there is the occasional twinge that reminds us that something organic was once there only now replaces by something inadequate for the mind and heart. As long as I'm bundled up and got a 'fire' to retreat to the darker months aren't too much of a bother. Quite resonant, this latest write of yours! Freds.