November is the cruelest month,
despite what certain poets say;
the brilliance of October's leaves,
their full regalia on display,
is dulled by grim November's gray,
whose brutal winds strip bare her trees.

The sun begins a slow retreat
behind the cover of wet clouds;
the day is shortened, like a breath,
caught beneath a falling shroud;
the nighttime silence seems so loud,
a dark approximating death.

What sights of summer still remain,
what smells and tastes of June, July,
are memories preserved in jars
of fruit, caressed and kissed by skies,
or flowers, pressed, heads once held high
to chase the sun, now fallen stars.

What has November to compare
to sullen pleasures of the spring?
As cruel as April seems to be,
the turbulence that month can bring,
there's still a promise on the wing
of earth in sweet fertility.

No, November is best endured,
its days held lightly, like the beads
of a rosary used in prayer,
an invocation of our need
to fill our hands once more with seed,
to breathe in blossoms of May air.


© by Mike Orlock.
Used with the author's permission.