Samhain night

This was from tonight's thought on the year's turning, and seeing a crow high on a tree in the late evening's dusk, just before the pink-footed geese and greylags flew over.

Turns the Year, Turns the Wheel:

Dusk lengthens, and the wind-whirled birling leaves

fall faster now, as days draw in apace.

An evening crow sits high upon her tree

to watch and call throughout the gathering dark.

Days remain mild yet, autumn so warm,

denying Samhain’s scents, with roses flowering,

and colours blending summer days and dusk:

Deep pink of cosmos, gold of fallen leaves.

A hedgehog grunts through heaped leaves, rustling spines,

goldfinches chime night greetings to their charm

and great skeins fly, in dusk, almost unseen,

their sounds upon the night winds bourne, to herald

winter’s coming, harbingers of cold.

This night, our candles flame and bonfires blaze,

a light before the dark, remembrance yet

of spring, of youth, of glowing summer light

as we turn to the dark of sleep, of dreams,

dormancy, reflection, visions past

and future, inward seeking for each promise

of memory and hope:

                                    and so we know

that at midwinter, light will come again.

©J Blain 2014