Friday, September 30, 2011

Pumpkin; Autumn.



Autumn

by Linda Pastan

I want to mention
summer ending
without meaning the death
of somebody loved

or even the death
of the trees.
Today in the market
I heard a mother say

Look at the pumpkins,
it's finally autumn!
And the child didn't think
of the death of her mother

which is due before her own
but tasted the sound
of the words on her clumsy tongue:
pumpkin; autumn.

Let the eye enlarge
with all it beholds.
I want to celebrate
color, how one red leaf

flickers like a match
held to a dry branch,
and the whole world goes up
in orange and gold.


Sara Lewis Holmes has the Poetry Friday round up today.

9 comments:

  1. You're right. No need for a commentary. The lovely poem speaks for itself. My favorite lines:

    "I want to celebrate
    color, how one red leaf

    flickers like a match
    held to a dry branch,
    and the whole world goes up
    in orange and gold."

    My heart is captured. :)

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  2. Wonderful poem, hadn't seen it before. Autumn is prone to melancholy; there is more depth in its beauty. :)

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  3. Thank you, Mary Lee - what a perfect poem for this change of seasons. I have a Linda Pastan poem for today, too! :0)

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  4. Glorious.

    On a side note, I live for Saturdays and my local farmer's market. Those apples! Those pumpkins! Those shocks of leafy kale! My bag is never big enough.

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  5. Love this and the celebration of life in autumn's colors. Thanks for sharing it!

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  6. What a wonderful blog. I am a third and fourth grade teacher and love the book recommendation and poems. I look forward to looking through past post. Thanks! :)

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  7. I am finally going through and reading all the poems. Linda Pastan is a favorite, so thank you for sharing still another of her beauties. When we think autumn is a 'blaze of color', she writes 'flickers like a match/held to a dry branch, and the whole world goes up/in orange and gold." Wonderful!

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  8. lovely lines...nicely crafted words!

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  9. Thank you for introducing me to Linda Pastan. I love discovering poets new to me on Poetry Friday.

    Let the eye enlarge
    with all it beholds.

    These lines will remind me to drink in beauty.

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