Last Walk

Hirsute gargoyle of the night

Sentinel of a terror to come
Creep out of corner and crevice
Move soft on the high ceilings
Take one last watchful walk
In dark angles of hairy wrong
A flowing sinuous bearing  
Tracing all our ancient fears
In the folds of ancient houses
Where the shadows lie thickest
Till winter settles you to sleep
And we may dream again at night

Leaves

On blue sky and fading sun

The autumn rainbow
Arches overhead
And the layered crescent
Shook gently by the wind
Releases its leaves to fall
Gold scattering on cold ground
We too are these glimmers
Caught within sunbeams
After a brief fire in the dark
And the growth of summer
Kissed by time, we yield
And then we are gone

Quiet

This is the quiet time
For autumn feasts
Soft landscapes
Watery skies
Russet edge woods
With fruited bulwarks
The story of summer is told
Now days of autumn unfold

Fade

As September rushes to close

Every seasonal flower submits
Weakens like crumbling parchment
Its colours fade like failing skin
In emaciated queues they rustle
Upon long, desiccating breezes
All sweet essence finally spent
Till the last petals fall like stars
To smoulder upon the eager earth
The sepulchre of a summer grace
And no colour is rekindled anew
For all shall now blacken and grey
Till the days are made again
If we can but linger till spring

 

Bag End

 I have been making a little folly in the garden for the last month. It started off quite simply, but you know how these things develop when you have too much time on your hands. But it achieved its objective and adds a little interest to a rather dull bank. It is my take on the hobbit house 'Bag End' in Lord of the Rings with the rather limited range of materials on hand.

 

Though I am pleased with it, the crowning glory is really the Acer on the little hill on the roof. It is a simply stunning autumn colour at the moment. It was also the single most expensive thing of the whole project.

Before I started

 

 

Getting the front done

 

 

The finished folly

 

The Acer

Winter is Coming

Swallow ready for flight
Mist sweats upon cooling ground
And the harvest is upon us
Butterflies close nascent wings
And lie still in dreams
Cling to walls like peeling paper
So comes nights waxing
Burrow deep little rabbits
For winter is coming
And as darks great cloak wraps
Sleep deep in shelter
Feast on hard won bounty
While we reminisce by the firelight
Till we are again
On the opposite side of the sun
Ready to watch the world open again
 

Exodus

We bloom in the long starlight

Priceless are we; beyond measure
The long whisper of eternity
The spirit of the universe
It seeds us in the wombs
Enters our heart at inception
And birth is its germination
Yet all our instance wanes
The stalking horse of finality follows
Though time would have us briefly believe
We are immortal
Before the slow tide gathers pace
To take us to another shore

She

Some men half her age will often give a secret glance

For the years have been kind to her open countenance
Compassion is the emotion she wears proud on her face
Yet she can still move and dance with a cat-like grace
She sings just like and angel; with a sonorous refrain
She cares for the world and causes absolutely no pain
And where once was a Venus rising out from the sea
Stands now magnificent matriarch dispensing hot tea
She is a ship of state with all her colours unfurled
Her mighty prow harboured in her love for the world
And though she now sails the last seas of instance
Never once was she becalmed by life's stormy dance
She is serene without peer, both an oracle and seer
Has everything to lose and absolutely nothing to fear
And when very rarely, she may act a little queer
Think how you'll be, when you've lived so long my dear

Instance

For tomorrow comes and we are reborn again

It is all we have and each sunrise is enough
Like flames rekindled in the ashes of fortune
To either burn or to fade, but ever to warm
We are circumstance only while conscious
A flowering of thoughts inhabiting daylight
We are a veil of secrecy covering a masterpiece
Painting a new section upon it every day
Till we slip away to silence deep into night
A transiting new moon upon an eager lifetime
And we are no more till we may awake again
And if we never awaken we had our instance
And instance is the scent of time upon a being

Sentience

There is a natural collective of living things

Sharing with us this great and blue Earth
Yet we deny other sentience is widespread
For we fear to share with its existence
So we eradicate it; consume its strength
Lest it reveals how fleeting and weak we are
And our cruelty overwhelms us in dishonour

Time

To each comes time

And it is malleable
We may stretch it
Or we may wound it
But we never unmake it
It was absolute and just
It is only when
White coated syntheticy
With phials and tubes
Scalpel and silicon
Lengthen and scar time
Does our equality perish
And a new evolution proceed
Borne of wealth, it is close now
Time is cowed second by second
This is selective advancement
And you may not choose sides
No matter the inequality

Mini Lop Rabbit

Look what we found in the garden. Hopefully somebody will claim him or sadly I might just have to keep him. I made a little temporary hutch in the greenhouse and bought some food. There was some winter kale for planting out in there and the emphasis is now on 'was'.

Spice

And I was made for this

To live in peace
In long, cool, summers
Below snowy mountains
Where skin is clear
And spice flows like water
Winding across senses
Scented snakes slithering
Across the call of time