FALL NOTE

NEWS OF THE WORLD #26

Should I begin with all the begots? 

From the beginning and skip the nots?

There’s much today we’d rather forgot. 

Still, where to begin, if not with rot.

…..

Were you surprised our age once was wise?

With sages on-call sunset to rise,

Our mages prescribed, divined, devised

Bright futures for all under blue skies.

Did I say futures? Perhaps just one—

Bright as the light of a midnight sun.

Bundled and spindled while it is spun,

Cloth like the wind or the great sea’s run.

And of that future? Well, it’s your past.

(Lest you’re reading this prosy poem last.)

We’d learned not to breathe after the Blast,

When the world turned over, sere and vast.

…..

There’s some delight, this not being right:

The pressure is off the blind for sight.

Like a boxer’s last count ends his fight,

Gifting the fallen a peaceful night.

For we’d lost our marbles, boiled in pots.

Just like froggy when it grew too hot.

WASTELANDS-Я-US—it’s Paradise Not!

Brown is the hue of our once-blue spot.

…..

Our rulers ruled earth once more was flat,

Drawing new lines ‘top those that once sat

‘Neath others some war had once begat,

While knocking the rest in a cocked hat.

“CORRUPTION ON EARTH!” was the latest charge,

Made to hold souls and those still at large

And all who would board Charon’s last barge

Liable for grace and early discharge. 

 

As did laws that kept shadows of sin

Far from the steeples we huddled in,

Where bishops taught lest pupils might win

Their place in the sun and freedom’s skin.

…..

War drums sound like the baying of hounds.

Cannons rally and fire their rounds.

Bombs in the churchyards, in fields and towns,

Leave behind stains and furious frowns.

 

Who does not rage such a dismal age!

When books that are written page by page

Tell of a world that’s more than a gage,

More than a vault and more than a cage.

…..

Future, when musing our times gone by,

Will you please tell them that we did try?

And though we'd wrecked both the earth and sky, 

Our gift's still a place that's warm and dry.

 

 

 I THOUGHT it best to GET FALL OVER WITH, as the white stuff is starting to blow round the corners of my house and across the driveway, adding a  light frosting of winter, with the promise of much more to come. And so, I WAS OUT WALKING in the park near where I live earlier last month, and crossing a field, I happened upon this beautiful tree lit by the afternoon sun. Its branches held thick layers of leaves and a breeze made gentle ripples flow throughout the brilliant canopy, almost like a coral reef, with its colourful fronds and tubes and sea grasses swaying in the currents, back and forth.

I WANTED A PICTURE of the scene, to remind me of the near perfect sun and autumn colours, but I had left my camera in the car and didn’t want to go back to get it. But, I was determined to return the next day and take a few snapshots. And, wouldn't you know, it was cloudy and rainy the rest of the week. When I got back to the park it was dry and sunny again and, armed with my camera, I went in search of my tree. OF COURSE, dear reader, one day is not the same as another, and the moment had invariably passed. THE TREE'S VIVID COLOURS weren’t quite what they had been  earlier. The canopy seemed a little sparer, the afternoon light a little paler, and there was little breeze around to stir the leaves into motion. I took this picture any way, because the tree is BEAUTIFUL; it’s just that I didn’t share in its beauty like I had earlier.

“You can’t go home again.” You can’t “step into the same river twice”. And you can’t keep a moment no matter how hard you try. It's bound to slip though your fingers like sand and all you can do is notice it in passing.

THE TREE in the photograph is beautiful, though it’s not the same tree that earlier made me stop and look.  And I am not the same person as I was a few days ago. Nor will I, the tree, the day, the breeze, or time be the same a few days hence. That's just the way it goes.  “Ain’t life unkind”, as the song says.*

 

Cheers, Jake.

_____________________________________

 

* Now to do another post on the war in Ukraine! It seems like other wars, only different, somehow. 

 

 

 

 

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