Autmn progresses into winter. These poems were revised at the time of writing and have not been touched since. I let most of my poems simmer for a while, as long as two years, before starting on revisions. The titles are provisional. In fact I haven't yet found a good title for the first. Suggestions are welcome.
LAST NIGHT IT RAINED
Yesterday the leaves lay
In huge drifts across the lawn,
In one corner, beech leaves glowed
Bright titian red, orange and gold,
As if some profligate fairy had piled
Evanescent riches there. In the hollow,
Brown sycamore hands rattled curled fingers;
The dogs, excited by the sound, rushed wildly
Into the scatter, and the rustle was like rain
On summer trees. Last night it rained.
Today the leaves lie sodden and silent.
The dogs scamper over a quiet carpet,
Puzzled by its silence; their barks echo
Among the trunks of trees stripped bare.
The grass stretches to the far boundary.
In the late sunlight, long shadows
Lie like dark scarves on the vivid green.
Trees embrace the park
In a loving girdle.
Voices rise in the still air:
The sound of a kicked ball,
The click of bowls. It is chilly now.
The autumn afternoon sun
No longer warms the benches.
Dogs run and bark; old women
Sit apart from old men on separate benches,
Bleakly alone. Oblivious of passers-by,
A woman walks her dogs. This park
Generates loneliness, the long shadows
Dividing us one from another,
The setting sun a premonition
Of a decrepit and lonely old age.
Jane Bhandari
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