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or View from the Window" poems
October Lane
Written for the October Year 3 topic of
"Tanka"
Maples banked and massed
Drip gold, russet, copper down
In cool slanting light,
New-minted. On surging leaves
Sweeps in old earth’s last-born joy.
From an October Window
Written for the October Year 3 topic of
"Tanka or View from the Window"
The early cold bit sore,
But eastering outdoor
The sun spread ribbons four
Across the sky:
Orange and gold he rose
Upon that season’s close,
Unfurling flag of those
Who soon must die.
The garden-lawns showed white
The dew-fall of the night,
And in the nearing light
Glimmered the blades,
While branches, stiff and still
Seemed from my clammy sill
Slowly to thaw and fill
And melt their shades.
A breeze uprose to shake
The ore from bough and brake,
And stir them all awake
On that last day
As one who, marshalling
Some long-planned voyaging,
Had purposed now to bring
His craft away.
Scything though every frond,
Light fired each chestnut-wand:
Wind lashed the mass beyond
To sway and shift;
The mad woods brooked no bird,
When at the gold-wind’s word,
The whirling trees conferred
Their final gift.
© Colin Bailey, October 2008
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