Center for Journal Therapy
Grant Street Mansion
1115 Grant St. #207
Denver, CO 80203
Voice: 888-421-2298
Denver metro: 303-986-6460
Fax: 303-985-3903
Contact Us >>

Poem of the Month: October 2006

Another Autumn Another autumn, the dogwoods turning first, their hard berries bright as drops of blood in the oak woods where a wild fox limped past just yesterday -- a harsher bleeding, and the sound of hounds came faint as a scent on the wind, barred I had thought from this wilderness of suburbs. I looked out my kitchen window this morning and saw a deer, tame as some neighbor's dog, eating the rhododendrons, and I listened for the small thunder of shotguns to stop that beautiful, omnivorous mouth. The cold will come on fast now. Last week I emptied the closet of its summer dresses; draped over my arm they were pale and insubstantial as last spring's flowers, and the wool sweaters and skirts I hung in their place depressed me with their heaviness, their dull, nut colors. This is the true start of the year; the Jewish calendar knows it, the school calendar too. maybe that's why our old dreams come back to taunt us, hanging before our faces like condensed breath on this chilly air.   - Linda Pastan Journal prompts: What is the mood that October typically invokes in you? Is this October the same, or different? Explore. What rituals do you have for the changing of the seasons? Have you done them yet? What is the "true start" that is happening for you this autumn? Write a Captured Moment of the landscape before you, with fall colors or flowers and autumn sky.

The Poems of the Month are copyrighted in the names of the individual authors, and are reproduced here for educational and therapeutic purposes.

back to top
back to library index