Thursday, October 01, 2015

October's Bright Blue Skies

This sunflower graced my garden last year.

There is something so spectacular in turning the calendar to October especially here in northern Indiana. Everything smells crisper...the colors brighter...and most folks appear to be in a state of pleasantness. When I was a teacher in the public schools one of my colleagues always read this to his class on the first day of October. Each one in turn had to memorize it. It may be the only poem that the students knew by heart. 

Today my two grandsons were over for breakfast before walking off to school. As is my habit, we had breakfast by candlelight and then the poem recitation. This was, of course, today's poem for them and for you. Happy October.
“October’s Bright Blue Weather”
O SUNS and skies and clouds of June,
And flowers of June together,
Ye cannot rival for one hour
October’s bright blue weather;
n loud the bumble-bee makes haste,
Belated, thriftless vagrant,
And Golden-Rod is dying fast,
And lanes with grapes are fragrant;
When Gentians roll their fringes tight
To save them for the morning,
And chestnuts fall from satin burrs
Without a sound of warning;
When on the ground red apples lie
In piles like jewels shining,
And redder still on old stone walls
Are leaves of woodbine twining;
When all the lovely wayside things
Their white-winged seeds are sowing,
And in the fields, still green and fair,
Late aftermaths are growing;
When springs run low, and on the brooks,
In idle golden freighting,
Bright leaves sink noiseless in the hush
Of woods, for winter waiting;
When comrades seek sweet country haunts,
By twos and twos together,
And count like misers, hour by hour,
October’s bright blue weather.
O suns and skies and flowers of June,
Count all your boasts together,
Love loveth best of all the year
October’s bright blue weather.
Helen Hunt Jackson

Spring break in St. Pete...

  Adam and his pups! The late-night flight is full. Everyone is heading out for spring break. Students and teachers, moms and dads, kids and...