' Black Autumn { For My Silent Mentor Edgar Allan Poe}... Poem by Frank James Ryan Jr...fjr

' Black Autumn { For My Silent Mentor Edgar Allan Poe}...

Rating: 4.8


Comes the cold, black, Death of Autumn,
harbouring its' pique on naked limb;
stirring damp, feral winds
to the hawking, stalking,
insidious squawking...
of ominous, petulant birds,
large, pestilent birds,
inexorabally, ever circling
'neath the late day shadows
from a cold november sun.

Come the crows, their angry eyes... beating,
the kind you felt breathing o'er your neck
the first time you read, 'The Raven'.
Teasing breeze-spun tumbleweeds,
rolling over dry cornfields... spewing-
threads and shard of stems and husk,
gaunt signs of a harvest dying.
Clouds bleed deepest sage, and drape
over tense foreboding presence -
of dark-winged beasts in flock,
fecklessly searching
hopelessly lurching
for any cynical signs
that autumn had not yet abandoned them.

Dark and black, blackest black,
hovering o'er the last man...
standing,
in this smoke-dusted cornfield,
stoic......and statuesque,
donned in spirited plaid,
its cloth, nor'easternly tattered;
with colors fading as fast
as the final stages of autumntide.

He is guardian of the Harvest,
protector of the field,
intrepidly perched
over a cornucopia
of Autumns end-stage.

And so hangs the Scarecrow
upon six feet of wood,
weathered, yet sturdy,
strapped high in pose -
arm-limbs out-stretched
resembling crucifixion.

Comes the taunting of the beasts,
their harsh kick of wing-gust
as each crow finds its place,
precision arrow flanked,
with bitter sense and arrogance,
playing to the wind,
grieving on the Death-
Death of the Harvest,
their Autumn fast slipping
fast slipping...slipping away;
to the smirk of winters spite
spread in wafts of early frost,
Autumns 'crystal-meth'!

And, the Crows, ever bastards
take their angst to the Strawman
obsessively circling, compulsively swooping
drooping, looping by night-
their black eyes stab like dart-tips....so piercing.

Thus, the Strawman succumbs
to a wind-flounced dance, and-
to the evil delight of its menacing prey,
while winds southward concert
a choir of pitched soprano
like fifes on air,
tipping the tree-tops
with ranged whistle and echo.

Comes Autumns colourless Death,
bare, brittle...a woeful Death.
No eulogy be choired here-
as Winters crypt seals itself
assuring Autumns air hath passed-
away on Mother Natures watch -
ostensibly over night.

And the Crows, cold and jaded,
fly away as same they came
wreaking havoc south of cottonland,
'till the April month
when melting ice
rears verved buds
on verdant limbs
of a Spring awaiting birth and breath,
and Renaissance
When they come...once again,
........................they always do.

__________ ~ F j R ~ _____________

Published December 01,2011

Thursday, May 21, 2009
Topic(s) of this poem: tribute,autumn
COMMENTS OF THE POEM
Sally Plumb Plumb 27 May 2015

Very enjoyable. Good write.

1 0 Reply
Sally Plumb Plumb 03 June 2015

I've read this a second time. Gets better and better.

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Good Saturday Morning ToThe High Schools & Middle Schools of the GREENBURGH/EDGEMONT School District #9 Welcome, and thank you for visiting my work today, this Saturday, July 11th,2015... The High schools and middle schools of Edgemont and Greenburgh have continued to achieve status in the upper 15% of The nation, which is an achievement all of you, both student body, and faculty, and certainly not to forget your dedicated administrators, who made this visit possible today should all be proud of...As a rule, I don't like to pin-point any specific work of mine to hone in on, however, those that appear on the first two pages of my jacket of work seem to garner the most visits on average. So I'm going to have to assume that if I've done anything right with pen in hand, that it wound up on the first two pages of work..LoL! .Hope you enjoy...And, BTW, this site has tens of thousands of members, many f good merit quality...Don't make today your only visit...make it your first of, many visits to the poem pages of some very polished Poet's and Writers. Finally, for any of you who have either dabbled, are dabbling and or have an itching to dabble in the beauty & sophistication of the Literary Arts.., I strongly recommend that you consider becoming a member.There is no membership fee, and you will have the works of tens of thousands from 5 continents at your fingertips, to read, study, critique, share and post your own work on a 24/7/365 basis. So, enjoy...and through my prv. email, please let me know what you're thinking...what you liked, disliked...anything you want to share with me...I can take it, trust me... I once was a well known(to internet sites & local poetry clubs) as a harsh, dragon mouth critic, you know, like Donald Trump, only broke! LoL! Frank James Ryan, Jr./ I.P.M...Library of Congress, Washington D.C./USA

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Frank James Ryan Jr...fjr 01 August 2015

Welcome Summer semester class & soon to be grads from Empire College of upstate N.Y. Thank You for choosing my work for your Literary 3 study project. Earlier in the week, I was in contact with your Literary Arts Dept, and they agreed with my recommendations as to what pieces might be most supportive to your research and report.Good Luck on your projects...A+'s and nothing less! ! ! Frank James Ryan, Jr

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Catrina Heart 21 May 2009

nature imagery interconnected to humanity.......crafted in excellence! ...10 +++++++

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Walterrean Salley 08 June 2021

Love this poem, Frank.

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Sylvia Frances Chan 03 December 2018

Beautiful BLACK AUTUMN, but eerie, haunting and blackest as the Black Spot of Sir Einstein. Blackest Poem, but truly of greatest Beauty, and POE, I know so well. Frank, enjoyed your precious ODE to Poe. I like this a very lot and I have deep respect for the man behind this poem, Congratulations! Up to MyPoemList and to MyPoetList.

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Luo Zhihai 20 October 2017

Beautiful imagery and a fine rhythmic flow. Great piece. Keep it up!

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Yasmin Khan 02 September 2016

Blackness streaks through the whole verse. Realities expressed in symbols though symbolic poetry is not easy to understand.

1 0 Reply
Bri Edwards 20 December 2015

i was tempted to not leave a comment, but i must now, after reading that students sometimes are exposed to this poem. i want to mention that you seem to use apostrophes some places where they don't belong and not use them where they belong. am i imagining this? for example: you use “ ‘till “, not “til”, “till”, or “ ‘til, ….. or until! - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - here is one Google article: Motivated Grammar Prescriptivism Must Die! Til v. till v. ’til v. until November 23,2007 in abbreviations, grammar, history, spelling, Uncategorized, words My roommate asked me how to spell the first word of Till death do us part (for reasons that I don’t fully recall, but it definitely wasn’t because we were starting some odd sort of relationship) . We agreed there were three possibilities: til, till, ’til I quickly responded that ’til was the logical choice, a truncation of until, with the missing un marked by an apostrophe. Open-and-shut case. Except that it wasn’t. It kept gnawing at me. Had I seen people use till in that context? Why would they do that? So I made the same mistake I often do, and I looked into exactly what the deal was. First off, let’s look at some proponents of each form: ‘Tils: ‘Til Tuesday, Aimee Mann’s semi-pivotal 80s band ‘Til Death, Brad Garrett’s follow-up to Everybody Loves Raymond Waiting ‘Til the Midnight Hour: A Narrative History of Black Power in America Tills: Till Death Us Do Part, British sitcom that paved the way for All in the Family From Dusk Till Dawn, movie featuring Salma Hayek dancing and (so it is rumored) some other plot as well. (Til is hard to find attestations of — people seem to be pretty good at remembering to put apostrophes at the words when the first syllable is removed.) So why would anyone spell it till if it’s coming from until? Well, it turns out that till isn’t derived from until. Till and ’til are actually two different words with two different etymologies. Till is the earlier form, attested as early as 1330; Until is actually derived from till, not the other way around as in ’til (a backformation which showed up much later) . Both are common, so it’s up to you which one you like. Till is commoner in Scotland, where it can be used like dative to in some situations, while ’til is commoner in the U.S. Take your pick. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - you also could use a couple of apostrophes in these lines: “Comes Autumns colourless Death, bare, brittle...a woeful Death. No eulogy be choired here- as Winters crypt seals itself”....................................... hmmm? otherwise ‘interesting’ poem. but not my favorite. if you like The Raven AND humor/humour: here is my ‘Maven’ poem: 1. Quoth The Maven: “never More”.... [long; Humor; Loneliness; A Little Sex, And Food] bri :)

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Frank James Ryan Jr...fjr

Frank James Ryan Jr...fjr

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