The leaves
seemed to wither and die
slowly this year,
as if the foliage red
sliced its veins and slowly
bled out.
Autumn glows yellow
like a book gradually develops
jaundice and eventually
collapses into dust.

The possibilities
of Summer are gone
and Winter inches her
ice-cold eyes
over the horizon,
turning her gaze inward
as the skies turn gray
and melancholy falls
like a torrent of freezing rain.

I ponder these things
while birds begin their
southern retreat
and night-time darkness
arrives swifly,
equipped with
Orion's Belt as
a holster and
the Crescent Moon as
a revolver.

My feet seem to be frozen
to dawn's frost as it
wraps it's frigid fingers
around my ankles -
shackles fitting for a
prisoner trapped in
the Season's purgatory.

The smell of autumn
Thick in the air
Colored leaves
The trees to wear
A quiet stream
Hidden and deep
A tender secret
The forest must keep
And presiding over all
The great harvest moon
Heralding winter
Coming thus soon

Autumnus
Where is the Sun,
away from the light,
of the Northern hum
Days are shorter
Here they come,
long cosy nights,
Sun retracted,
distanced, and done,
far from the
Northern Hemisphere,
Solar Sun,
cold of the Northern Pole
biting at one,
bring on cosy nights,
warm hum hum,
feel free to distance,
warm Solar Sun

© 2020  Carol Natasha Diviney

i must be in one of those... "moods"...
    i must be in such circumstances follow an almost
ritual: the beauty of life...
coupled with the "fairness" of it...
notably when sharing it with people:
of a more... "south of the border"...
a more sour invitation to it...

                  my "free will": my... what little is it...
when someone else might: rest assured...
express his or her... "alternative"...
                      this a choice...

the wine has ran! down into the gob that
sometimes forgets to thirst...
and when not thirsting... does the unpardonable...
shelters itself in the abodes of ruining
patterns of shadow devoid of bodies...

drinks! listens to scandinavian pagan songs...
tiresome... tiresome those byzantine chants...
for all their worth: but enough is enough...
it would be the most precious time...
to translate some Horace...
   such be my need for solace -
but translation itself is hardly a comfort...

                       the cut-off reads...
   at *** tonantis annus hibernus Iovis
        imbris nivisque (conparat)...
       tonantis - thunderer
     hibernus - wintry
               annus - annum - year...
        imbris - growth...
        nivisque - snow... the cut-off is already:
as always crude...
                                    the whiskey is here!
and the romance of powder...
cheeks and roses! but we might as well
begin: from a beginning...

  beatus ille qui procul negotiis, ut prisca gens
mortalium, paterna rura bobus exercet suis
solutus omni faenore
    neque excitatur classico miles truci
  neque horret iratum mare
                       forumque vitat et superba civium
potentiorum limina.
   ergo aut adulta vitium propagine
altas maritat populos at in reducta valle
     mugientum prospectat errantis greges
inutilisque falce ramon amputans feliciores
insertit aut pressa puris mella condit amphoris
aut tondet infirmass ovis.
              vel *** decorum mitibus pomis caput
autumnus agris extulit,
         ut gaudet insitiva decerpens pita
certantem et uvam purpurae,
    qua muneretur te, Priape, et te, pater Silvane,
tutor finium.
           libet iacere modo sub antiqua ilice,
modo in tenaci gramine:
labuntur altis interim ripis aquae,
           queruntur in silvis aves fontesque
lymphis obstrepunt manantibus,
                             somnos quod invitet levis.

thus listening to some of what the british
patriots have to offer...
i'd call them the demeaning "natives"...
but then i have on offer...
scottish nationalism
and welsh nationalism...
not to mention the irish: but i'll mention them...
english nationalism...
      hmm...

solution: repatriation... of the "invaders"
of Brimingham...
i know what deportation looks like...
on the weekend that Dianna was
"repatriated": her coffin was towed...
the home office came knocking...
    father doing a runner...
         visiting grandfather broke up his affair
with sober -
'nice com-pew-ter' said the home office
grey...
i was left in tears and punching
the wall...
       so much for integration...
          did my best lizzy... the paperwork...
"got in the way"...
            doesn't matter: the kosovans came
in 1999 circa etc.
     the canines are out...
                  where is my, mosque?
                          where is my kebab stash?
beside the 2004 tsunami...
          
home is where: i have a sparrow's worth
of fear: and perhaps a heart...
when i land in warsaw and try to escape it...
i land in warsaw: i'm a native of these parts:
am i "at home"...
i'll walk you down route 25 bus
past all the babylon and i'll tell you:
nothing like it!
dodo among the peacocks...
humpty-dumpty and sacred cows brigade...
that's not quiet me... but...
         touch 'em with a two metre long
****** if you must!
      
   my affairs with england...
was supposed to be a stop-over...
further argentina... h'america...
     the bleach baptism: ha! ha! h'america!
in search of a great-grandfather...
   guess this is "home"...
sure as ****... warsaw isn't!
      
                   and these concerns...
i will not sing the: god save the queen...
i'd rather whistle to: the british grenadiers fife
& drum... on a scale of: a *****... a nilly...

italy is being "invaded"
germany is being "invaded"
denmark is being "invaded"....
england and france are being "invaded"...
no guns, no tanks... no blitzkrieg?
"invasion"? or just slacking and slurrping
a neo-liberal old liberal pompous brat affair?
sleep more sleep a more dire sleep...
wake up when it's all over...
in the hands of the other...

   an invasion: an "invasion"... no tanks...
just the stories of sorrow from knife-crime
statistics... collateral and human shields...
such concerns...
if it's not the invaders it's the romanians
picking lettuce or the polacks
on construction sites...
but i am as much an exile as anywhere...
and i don't really have a high degree of concern
for my "tribe": either...

   the slow warfare of economic ruin concerning
a town that was sizing up a status of city...
with two metallurgy theatres of operation...
gone: gruzy... heaps of rubble...
           hersch! herr hersch!
     how iz zis evens pozziblah?
               i don't mind the invaders...
marry one: then i might...
   have a little calipso moment and count:
the number of shades of cinnamon,
copper, bronze and cherokee...

                      whiplash... i must be daft...
not to have learned a thing or two from
the **** and the ******... to have to learn
a new: "thing or two" from the... liberals
with their: no tanks, no planes, no microwaves,
no l.s.d. "freedom's freedom" policy!

england big... big O england...
big o: O and exclaimation mark: O! england...
i am not wed to your daughters...
nor the father or grand fairy pater to
them either...
               i didn't bring a mosque!
i didn't bring a flag!
i didn't bring a suntan that retains its
glue in winter!
i didn't bring anything...
beside... there's this idea of a nation...
and there's that...
of a diaspora... which of course...
you had... but didn't...
when... the "proselytes" decided that:
an english diaspora is not:
in our vision... what would become
the invested: hope and character to build
as a grand, u. s. of a.....
so much for the "motherland and the fathertongue"...
or the "fatherland and the mothertongue"...
whittle ol' england...
whittle ol' bargain: and more!

i brought sauerkraut and a poppy-seed cake...
the german might as well have brought
the former... but it's hardly an argument:
the "invaders" from the east brought their own food...
shame... seeing you gobbling down a curry
and a kebab...
who am i to complain?
i eat them too! i have an arsenal of spices
that would most likely compete with
the nuke arsenal of russia!

                      i didn't "integrate" you didn't
"integrate"... i have your tongue as a dearest: polly...
who doesn't want a *******?
that h.p. sauce is genius?
              well... and cricket? but i'll eat your
gob-*****... you will not eat mine...
so you have your bangladeshi "invaders"...
your friday night: chinese take-away and soho...
ahem... "soho"... chinatown...

who's to be complaining?!
exotica! ex-o-tica!
                     shrimp **** and watermelon *****:
requiring... ***** extensions to **** around
with: **** jamai... can oh she cancan but not
in the parisian "sense"...
          
        well... given that this was supposed
to be a translation of Horace...
here's my ****** translation of latin...
it's not a curry... it's not a mosque...
it's not a burning flag it's not a turban...
it's not a roman catholic on a pike...
dying a death more formidable than
a crucifixion...
i'm guessing a viking settling in york:
with something of a believable
scandal when sense of humour is concerned...

i can't promise stale: hardly any poetry...

fortunate he, who from the city's uproar from afar,
free like people of older date,
    with oxen ploughs the fief of hereditary role,
oblivious to either profit or toll,
he doesn't know, what is the **** of a battle horn,
he doesn't tremble, when the sea grieves a vengence,
shuns away from the forum's uproar,
        he doesn't, like customers - who -
                 protrude under the doubling of the wealthy.
he prefers the lush shrubs of grapevines -
with shoots wed to the stump of a poplar tree,
overseeing, leading herds of roaring cows
into and among pastures on the slopes
of mountainous valleys...
             hunt boars... interlock with beef...
                  so as to have a noble variety of fruit,
from pressed plasters: honey sieved into amphorae
or clipper woolly sheep of the herd.
                - and when golden autumn above
the fields - donning a wreath of harvested wheat:
raises its head -
with what kind of ecstasy / delight...
tears the sight of grafted pears...
                   and bunches in clusters of purple -
should for Priapus and Silvanus,
     watchman's bordering copper, bring forth:
the first gifts.
     how pleasant to rest upon cushioning grass
or under a an old and shady oak:
where fluvial trends in precipitious stance
of banks errodes...
                     where the birds' graceful nagging...
foliage murmurs, streams of water incessant:
thus a dream make... unexpectedly.

estrada: tempus...
                            auditores? lemures!
stage: time...
            the audience? ghosts!
that's bound to happen... binding oneself
to a Horace...
       with what's already available...
the stage: the audience....
and beside: the audience: time...
        well... i rather enjoy entertaining...
a stage of time: and the audience of ghosts...
than have to resort / retort to
the latter "debacle"...

             i, didn't... bring an "invaders"...
detail... lucky for me...
of the german the zeppelin and the ******...
you didn't even have to taste
anything by the leftover mongol...
that crimea became the capital of
the diaspora... that the mongol became known
as the tartar...
                                      chebureki...

endear me! have you humpty-dumpties!
your sacred cows!
your mosques! your chinatown!
your frizzy and your froth!
your angst your liberals and your
huguenots!
your passive-aggresive secular "christianity"
tingling with **** atheism...
"your"... Birmingham!
"your"... Loon'don...
                            
             clywed y çymraeg!
                                    éist clann gàidhli!

seobheith!
           no heidegger: no "there"...
                        anois!
              
        YMA!
                                     YMABODAU!
i leave Wstminster to the porky-pies...
who with and with: "who":
where else?!

The track was hot with autumnus heat
While the bleachers reflected an open sunshine
I felt the rooted feeling of avoidance
The weighted awareness of my longing for release
Had convinced me to flee
For a brief moment
The unsettling rattle of companionship
Close by, but unseen
Stirred me with scent and sound
I sat in my relief trying to feel the rush of my
Fleeting toxins
Fleeing me

I reached out for something tangible
I could feel what was always familiar

I couldn't identify the vicious concerns
Wrapped so delicately in my routine
A dagger clutched me
Alike,  i’d clutched it
This pain dawns like a masquerade
With cheap, unforgiving cloth
The palette of my skin became malbec on a white dress tent
Enveloping the practice
Of being numb

Companionship became confusion
While the screams became louder
in the depths of screeching,
I could evacuate my despair
Though not without my tragedy
Leaving an echoing hum behind me
Forming dichotomy as if my pain
Was trying to escape me

Companionship became witness
A rambling explanation of a situation
Melted into self interrogation


Two contradicting ends of one spectrum
Colliding in unfavorable manors
Depleting nature of its pollination
Creates a channel of confessions

The hole was empty
the swelling left alpine bruises
Delicately observed

The dagger was gone
The evidence was towering and
The drive home was like floating
bare on an ice cap miles from
the nearest track.

But first etymological climatological meteorological esoterica:

The word autumn (/ˈɔːtəm/) is derived from Latin autumnus, archaic auctumnus, possibly from the ancient Etruscan root autu-and has within it connotations of the passing of the year. Alternative etymologies include Proto-Indo-European *h₃ewǵ- ("cold") or *h₂sows- ("dry").

If you reside in the Eastern time zone, then fall officially begins at 8:43 a.m., local time. The start of fall will be at 7:43 a.m. in the Central time zone, 6:43 a.m. in the Mountain time zone and 5:43 a.m. in the Pacific time zone.

Despite twittering, uber
sputtering kickstarting lyft
onset of cool weather
argh, another brief daily spate
re: forecasting blistering,
nauseating, sweltering...
ninety degree plus Fahrenheit
temperature forecast
(along eastern seaboard)
courtesy mister summer,
who will overstay his welcome
hoop fully a more seasonable
cooling trend rounds out ninth month
(according to Gregorian calendar).

The above lines crafted
when poetic endeavor
herewith follows tapped out
across qwerty keyboard
when this poem initially written
at least one earth orbit ago.

I eagerly looked forward
to crisp refreshing air
much more comfortable
to weather being outdoors
within/out this sequestered enclave
postage stamp size geographical area
offers respite versus metropolitan
denser population centers,
the former disappearing open space
rather disheartening, but urbanization -

purportedly the definition of progress
finds once open farmland
more than fifty plus years back
crumbling barns now tombstones
testimony when people
farmed the land, and lived
linkedin with rhythms of nature,
which only found courtesy said vestiges
inevitably razed (similar to boyhood home

324 Level Road) finds yours truly
brooding fast paced instant
credit karma gratification
twenty first century, which
small, medium forces at large
outfox the time tested imprimatur
i.e. latent powers planet Earth
unleashes (thank you global warming)
decrees final curtain call.

**** sapiens runs rampant
wreaking havoc all points of compass
already inundated with scorching,
melting ice caps, flooding...
future generations, yet unborn
might avoid predicated on
dramatic alternatives fossil fuels
already showered Gaia
with carbon dioxide
as well other noxious poisons
though vibrant advocacy
evident among students

vocally demonstrating against
irrevocable damage, whereby environment
and countries situated
near sea level take heavy hit,
nonetheless... cautious optimism flickers
inducing mandatory one hundred eighty degree
reorientation regarding eco friendly
methodologies to lo mein, maintain,
sustain... technological civilization,
else quaint existence of thee
will be read about
in digitized history books.