It's autumn again, and here is the poem to go with it.

It's that time again. I'm kind of lonely today so it's hard to be completely optimistic, but the loneliness is only external because I'm alone. At the core I am mostly warm and content when I think about the season and the past year.

Last year at this time we had lived here for less than a month. Our cats were babies and our dog wasn't even born yet. Now Smokey is nearly a year old and the kittens have switched over to cat food. We survived the cold winter and hot summer, and now the corn that surrounds our house is dry and raspy and sounds like a massive forest when the wind blows through it.

I know I mention this every year but--forgive me, for I will always remember it--one of the first years I sent out this poem I was on the farm and left the house bareheaded to feed the stock. This year the part of the poem I can relate most closely to (besides the appetizing air and the landscape through the haze on a crisp morning, which are givens every year) is the verse about apples and cider-making. No, I haven't made any cider, nor do I have piles of apples (I dearly wish I did), but I do have shelves and boxes full of canned goods that I made myself from the bounty of my garden. I believe I have made over four dozen pints of various pickles this year: everything from dilly beans to squash pickles to cheerful sweets and bread-and-butters, not to mention the relishes. I hope to add to it six pints of salsa tomorrow (cheater salsa, just add tomatoes, but they're my own tomatoes). This fall season I am celebrating the joys of the harvest. It's on a much smaller scale than when I was on the farm, but it's my own little harvest nonetheless.

Canning is what I do in my spare time, when I'm not in class or doing household chores. Next year I hope to do even more. I'm probably busier than I have ever been, but I am content with the busyness because my tasks are tasks I enjoy and that I have chosen for myself. The class I'm taking is H&R Block's income tax class, which I'm hoping will be my ticket out of Glen Haven where I'm working as a CNA. It may even lead to a seasonal career as a tax professional, perhaps (I hope) specializing in farm returns. You know me: my plans for the future are ever-shifting. This time, though, I feel that the plans reflect what I want for myself rather than what I feel is expected of me. And I am content with that.

Enjoy the poem.



James Whitcomb Riley. 1853–1916

"When the Frost is on the Punkin"

When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock,
And you hear the kyouck and gobble of the struttin' turkey-cock,
And the clackin' of the guineys, and the cluckin' of the hens,
And the rooster's hallylooyer as he tiptoes on the fence;
O, it's then the time a feller is a-feelin' at his best, 5
With the risin' sun to greet him from a night of peaceful rest,
As he leaves the house, bareheaded, and goes out to feed the stock,
When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock.

They's something kindo' harty-like about the atmusfere
When the heat of summer's over and the coolin' fall is here— 10
Of course we miss the flowers, and the blossoms on the trees,
And the mumble of the hummin'-birds and buzzin' of the bees;
But the air's so appetizin'; and the landscape through the haze
Of a crisp and sunny morning of the airly autumn days
Is a pictur' that no painter has the colorin' to mock— 15
When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock.

The husky, rusty russel of the tossels of the corn,
And the raspin' of the tangled leaves as golden as the morn;
The stubble in the furries—kindo' lonesome-like, but still
A-preachin' sermuns to us of the barns they growed to fill; 20
The strawstack in the medder, and the reaper in the shed;
The hosses in theyr stalls below—the clover overhead!—
O, it sets my hart a-clickin' like the tickin' of a clock,
When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock.

Then your apples all is gethered, and the ones a feller keeps 25
Is poured around the cellar-floor in red and yaller heaps;
And your cider-makin's over, and your wimmern-folks is through
With theyr mince and apple-butter, and theyr souse and sausage too!...
I don't know how to tell it—but ef such a thing could be
As the angels wantin' boardin', and they'd call around on me— 30
I'd want to 'commodate 'em—all the whole-indurin' flock—
When the frost is on the punkin and the fodder's in the shock.