Tag: Autumn

Moonlight Silver to Autumn Gold


Moonlight Silver to Autumn Gold

Amidst the ebb and flow of tides,
listen to silence
ineffable,
deafening to the restless
crabs that crawl
from shell to shell
upon the amber sands  —

Look up to the strands
of moonlight,
above  the darkened,
serried pines of cryptic
forests —

Ride the chariot
of the hours,
await,
watch the silver countries
turn to Autumn gold
in the warmth of the morning
sunlight.

by D. G. V.  © 2012

***Photography by D. G. Vachal © 2012

Originally posted 2012-10-21 08:31:29.

The Laughter of October


The Laughter of October

Mirth at sunset,
when herons scream
like children
in the shallows,
and up
on the branches,
aurulent shafts of light
play with the shadows
of auburn leaves —

Come to me and stay
awhile,
for the laughter of October
is upon my face,
a golden glow,
a raging fire that hides
in the Indian summers
of my heart.

by D. G. Vachal. © 2012

*** photography by DigitalArt2@Flickr Commons

Originally posted 2012-10-06 00:56:30.

November the Penultimate


November the Penultimate

Never was a month so motley in its days:
November, penultimate month
of a year that frames the seasons,
when leaves in early days
turn to brightest garnet,
blazing topaz,
illuminated gold —

the latter days arrive
with the fire of the winds,
and the burning leaves take the plunge
from infernal towers of the branches
to the burial grounds of a gun-
metal, brumal earth —

November, November,
calves ache from the marathon,
hearts pound the door
to another December

when holly berries huddle upon the petals
of the soft-spoken snow,
and the fallen leaves breathe again
at the sound of the carols of the children,
the children rejoicing.

D. G. Vachal © 2013

Photography Credit: November’s Decline by Bucaneve

Colors of Autumn

Colors of Autumn

The turning of colors
like the turning of tides,
the waxing moon’s gradient shift
to fullness
in pearlescent light,
the chilly air’s osmosis
imperceptible,
permeating a blanket of warmth —

emeralds turn to topaz,
malachite to rubies,
nightingale songs grow faint
as in a moment’s dream —

I was here
many times before
and once again I am

swept in this lunatic array
of colors:
salmon and salamander,
citrine and vermilion,
french horns and trombone,
a cacophony of shades and tinctures —

these moments soon will pass
like many times before
yet for a little while
let me wrap myself
in the colors of Autumn:
Joseph’s coat
of many colors.

D. G. Vachal © 2025

Author’s note: This poem was inspired by a passage from “The Strings are False” by the Irish poet Louis MacNeice. 

“The train for Jersey City was called the Blue Comet and I sat in a luxury Pullman car that was all windows and beyond the windows a reel of autumn madness, the maple trees gone drunk with colour. Tigers and wine, pimento, copper, coral, the bells of St. Clement’s jangling and fanfaronade of trumpets, fireworks out of the ground, Giorgione, Veronese, the tents of all the Sultans. People had told me about the American Fall, and this was it.”  (“Louis MacNeice, The Strings are False, Faber and Faber Limited, Great Britain, 1965, p. 30.”)

Image by: chensiyuan, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0&gt;, via Wikimedia Commons