“It was November – the month of crimson sunsets, parting birds, deep, sad hymns of the sea, passionate wind-songs in the pines.” - Lucy Maud Montgomery

“November–with uncanny witchery in its changed trees. With murky red sunsets flaming in smoky crimson behind the westering hills. With dear days when the austere woods were beautiful and gracious in a dignified serenity of folded hands and closed eyes–days full of a fine, pale sunshine that sifted through the late, leafless gold of the juniper-trees and glimmered among the grey beeches, lighting up evergreen banks of moss and washing the colonnades of the pines. Days with a high-sprung sky of flawless turquoise. Days when an exquisite melancholy seemed to hang over the landscape and dream about the lake. But days, too, of the wild blackness of great autumn storms, followed by dank, wet, streaming nights when there was witch-laughter in the pines and fitful moans among the mainland trees.” – L.M. Montgomery

 

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It is November

Trees settle in a new rhythm

Leaves drift and sway

Fall from sky to earth

Meld with the ground

Exchanging views

 

It is November

Waters rumble

Cold waves roar and recede

 

I collect leaves and pinecones

Scattered on the ground

And store memories

Like trinkets on a shelf

 

Toss what should be thrown

In the waters

Bury what should be forgotten

With leaves, to decompose

 

But treasure what is beautiful

And true

 

 

© prasanta, November 2017

 

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