As clouds roll o’er hills
Autumnal cool
Turns to
Winter cold
Grey blue skies
Turn grey black
Soon the rains will come
And the snow will fall
Children will play and
Parents will be dismayed
And the poet will be content to write
For winter is upon us
Copyright © JRFC From October 2018
This one is kind of a revision or maybe it’s better described as a reinterpretation of a piece that I wrote last year.
I hope you like.
Look ahead
Through snow-covered trees
Wrapped warm
Dance under crystal white branches
Winters grace
Cooling breeze soothes the soul
Float free
In currents of air, surfing with snowflakes
On high
Releasing unheavenly thoughts; free the mind
Breathe deep
The head clears from life’s stress
Be cleansed
Here’s a link to my previous version if you’d like to see it, cheers!
Copyright © JRFC November 2019 Image from Pixabay
O’er rambling valleys and rolling hills
Frosty breath clings to grass tips
As globules of cold dew drops
Glistening like white diamonds
In the bright sunshine
Slowly drawing in the warmth
Of the growing diurnal rhythms
They shy away to reveal
Pastures of emerald green
On this, a beautiful Autumn Day
Copyright © JRFC November 2019 Image from Pixabay
Robert Louis Stevenson and Autumn Fires
It’s autumn, no it’s not; oh yes it is and from the weather I have outside my window it’s well and truly autumn. Time to turn up the heating, snuggle on whatever piece of furniture you like best with who or what you like best and get comfy.
Here’s a little rhyme that, I think, sets the mood nicely for this time of year and will warm the cockles of your heart.
For those that don’t know, Robert Louis Stevenson was born and educated in Edinburgh, Scotland. He was a novelist and travel writer, most noted for such stories as Treasure Island, Kidnapped, and Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Oh yes folks it seems that Mr Stevenson had a bit of a macabre side; Go Robby!
Today though, for your delight and pleasure here is:
In the other gardens
And all up in the vale,
From the autumn bonfires
See the smoke trail!
Pleasant summer over,
And all the summer flowers,
The red fire blazes,
The grey smoke towers.
Sing a song of seasons!
Something bright in all!
Flowers in the summer,
Fires in the fall!
R S Thomas and Evans
Ronald Stuart Thomas was born in the March of 1913 in the Welsh capital Cardiff and published as R S Thomas. This little welsh number is from the book Poetry for Supper first published in 1958.
When I read this poem my first thought was for poor Evans, on his death bed, alone. Where were his family, friends; neighbours?
Then the macabre in my came out and made me think about the person in the cottage, talking to us about Evans; what was their story? Doctor, Stranger or…
Evans? Yes, many a time
I came down his bare flight
Of stairs into the gaunt kitchen
With its wood fire, where crickets sang
Accompaniment to the black kettle’s
Whine, and so into the cold
Dark to smother in the thick tide
Of night that drifted about the walls
Of his stark farm on the hill ridge.
It was not the dark filling my eyes
And mouth apalled me; not even the drip
Of rain like blood from the one tree
Weather-tortured. It was the dark
Silting the veins of that sick man
I left stranded upon the vast
And lonely shore of his bleak bed.
