Indian summer

We had gotten so used to long hot summers, that when the summer of 2007 was not so hot, many of us mistakenly thought it cool.

It was during the autumn that followed, with a spot of warm weather, I travelled down to Brighton, to enjoy the last of the warm sunny days before winter arrived. On my way down I delighted in the autumn colours. [see Synchronicity and Paulo Coelho]

It was therefore most apt and with great pleasure, I enjoyed Alwyn Marriage's reading of 'Indian Summer' at the Guildford Institute in Guildford one autumn evening during the Guildford Book Festival.

Late September, and the sun
is trying to make amends
for months of gloom
and dreary summer days.

It lights a thousand colours
on the ground
and plays at hide and seek
as every fly
for miles around
is going mad,
maintaining the crescendo
of a generation born too late.

Are they rejoicing in the sudden heat
or just afraid to die?

Reproduced by kind permission of Alwyn Marriage from her collection Touching Earth.


Literature ~ Alwyn Marriage
(c) Keith Parkins 2007 -- October 2007 rev 0