Poetry Wanted: Seasons of a2k.

A Vagabond Song
By Bliss Carman
1861-1929

There is something in the autumn that is native to my blood --
Touch of manner, hint of mood;
And my heart is like a rhyme,
With the yellow and the purple and the crimson keeping time.

The scarlet of the maples can shake me like a cry
Of bugles going by.
And my lonely spirit thrills
To see the frosty asters like a smoke upon the hills.

There is something in October sets the gypsy blood astir;
We must rise and follow her,
When from every hill of flame
She calls and calls each vagabond by name.

tsarstepan, I wrote an original poem about Autumn. Should you like to read it, I will give you the link.

Link, s'il vous plait. I would love to read your poem. Based on this wonderful work of poetry you introduced me to, clearly your poetic senses and sensibilities far transcend my own. I'm eager to read you seasonal ode.

I am just glad that poetry is once more important here, tsarstepan

Here's the link, and djjd has beautiful photo's to go with it.

http://able2know.org/topic/136602-1

John Keats - To Autumn
I

Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;
To bend with apples the moss'd cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For Summer has o'er-brimm'd their clammy cells.


II

Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reap'd furrow sound asleep,
Drows'd with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers:
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.


III

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too, -
While barred clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.










(Of course, it's spring here....but I don't DO seasonal poetry really)

What you shown me is that I need to read more Keats. Thank you. And I hope the beginnings of your spring time is an auspicious and notable one.

So far it is a cold and wet one....but Keats is a treasure.

"to bend with apples the mossd cottage trees" Damn, Deb. I had forgotten how much I love Keats.

The Artist's Confiteor--Baudelaire

How poignant the late afternoons of autumn! Ah! poignant to the verge of pain, for there are certain delicious sensations which are no less intense for being vague; and there is no sharper point than that of Infinity.

What bliss to plunge the eyes into the immensity of sky and sea! Solitude, silence, incomparable chastity of the blue! a tiny sail shivering on the horizon, imitating by its littleness and loneliness my irremediable existence, monotonous melody of the waves, all these things think through me or I through them (for in the grandeur of reverie the ego is quickly lost!) ; I say they think, but musically and picturesquely, without quibblings, without syllogisms, without deductions.

These thoughts, whether they come from me or spring from things, soon, at all events, grow too intense. Energy in voluptuousness creates uneasiness and actual pain. My nerves are strung to such a pitch that they can no longer give out anything but shrill and painful vibrations.

And now the profound depth of the sky dismays me; its purity irritates me. The insensibility of the sea, the immutability of the whole spectacle revolt me ... Ah! must one eternally suffer, or else eternally flee beauty? Nature, pitiless sorceress, ever victorious rival, do let me be! Stop tempting my desires and my pride! The study of beauty is a duel in which the artist shrieks with terror before being overcome.

Ah! That one I know but it's the first time I see it in English..

When I first discovered Baudelaire, I wished I hadn't goofed off so much in my high school French class. A shame.

Autumn Leaves

The falling leaves drift by the window
The autumn leaves of red and gold
I see your lips, the summer kisses
The sun-burned hands I used to hold

Since you went away the days grow long
And soon I'll hear old winter's song
But I miss you most of all my darling
When autumn leaves start to fall

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Gy5GUYC3Ug

That one is French too..

I hope it will not come to haunt you for the rest of your life..

Interesting, Francis, I just looked up the lyrics in French. I've only ever heard the "break" and not the verses in French and so I didn't realize they referred to autumn as well.

The lyrics in English are not a translation but a different version..

Here is a translation of the original French lyrics:

Oh! I would like as much as you remember
The happy days where we were friends.
In this time the life was more beautiful,
And the sun more burning than today.
The dead leaves collected with the shovel.
You see, I did not forget...
The dead leaves collected with the shovel,
The memories and the regrets also
And the wind of North carries them
In the cold night of the lapse of memory.
You see, I did not forget
The song that you sang me.

This is a song which resembles to us.
You, you loved me and I loved you
And we lived both together,
You who loved me, me who loved you.
But the life separate those which love themselves,
All softly, without making noise
And the sea erases on the sand
The Steps of divided lovers.

The dead leaves collected with the shovel,
The memories and the regrets also
But my quiet and faithful love
Smiles always and thanks the life
I loved you so much, you was so pretty.
Why do you want that I forget you ?
In this time, the life was more beautiful
And the sun more burning than today.
You were my softer friend
But I don't have only to make regrets
And the song than you sang,
Always, always I will hear it !

Thanks Francis, it is indeed, very different from the English version (and much prettier in French).

I have to say that I love that song..

Eva Cassidy does a beautiful job, doesn't she?

I really like the melody and the chorus lyrics are beautiful, if sad. I used to attempt the French version (chorus only as that's all I knew) many years ago with my Ontario accent. Nobody ever complained -- well, perhaps they were just being kind.

Or perhaps they were just being honest...

Eva has a beautiful voice..