October

Rick Stevens

October

The green elm with the one great bough of gold

Lets leaves into the grass slip, one by one, --

The short hill grass, the mushrooms small milk-white,

Harebell and scabious and tormentil,

That blackberry and gorse, in dew and sun,

Bow down to; and the wind travels too light

To shake the fallen birch leaves from the fern;

The gossamers wander at their own will.

At heavier steps than birds' the squirrels scold.

The rich scene has grown fresh again and new

As Spring and to the touch is not more cool

Than it is warm to the gaze; and now I might

As happy be as earth is beautiful,

Were I some other or with earth could turn

In alternation of violet and rose,

Harebell and snowdrop, at their season due,

And gorse that has no time not to be gay.

But if this be not happiness, -- who knows?

Some day I shall think this a happy day,

And this mood by the name of melancholy

Shall no more blackened and obscured be.

Edward Thomas

I wonder how long the image of the elm tree waited in Edward's mind until it finally broke out in poetry. How many moments stay with us and we have no idea why? And do these images/moments/scenes silently germinate within us over time?

“Some day I shall think this a happy day,

And this mood by the name of melancholy,

Shall no more blackened and obscured be.”

Those lines impress me. The speaker is melancholy, he doesn’t say why, and I like that too – (how often do we understand exactly why a feeling overtakes us?) but there is also this green elm with one great bough of gold. It’s enough to give him hope that he will feel different one day, better – perhaps even happy.