Poetry Sunday: October

And so we have arrived at October, and this week we began to be able to feel that autumn had actually begun. Our days were mild and pleasant and our nighttime temperatures got as low as the high 50s. 

My husband remarked about how good it feels to get up early in the morning when it is cool. Now, I'm no early morning person myself and yet I know what he means. It is refreshing to walk outside on a "hushed October morning mild" and feel the brisk air and hear the calls of the crows as they gather in the woods near our house.

Robert Frost has caught that feeling with his poem and he seems to be wishing here that time will slow before winter comes as he urges his readers to appreciate each moment, each single leaf that falls, the early morning mists that "enchant the land with amethyst." It will be a while before the leaves here "are burnt with frost" but we should not waste any of the beautiful days that October brings us.

October

by Robert Frost

O hushed October morning mild
Thy leaves have ripened to the fall;
Tomorrow's wind, if it be wild
Should waste them all 
The crows above the forest call;
Tomorrow they may form and go
O hushed October morning mild
Begin the hours of this day slow
Make the day seem to us less brief
Hearts not averse to being beguiled
Beguile us in the way you know;
Release one leaf at break of day;
At noon release another leaf;
One from our trees, one far away;
Retard the sun with gentle mist;
Enchant the land with amethyst
Slow, slow!
For the grapes' sake, if they were all
Whose leaves already are burnt with frost
Whose clustered fruit must else be lost -
For the grapes' sake along the wall