Patrick Osada
Poetry
 

POETRY


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Here's a selection of my poems for OCTOBER


I update this website at the start of each month with a fresh selection of my poetry.      


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TO A GRANDCHILD IN AUTUMN


As summer leaves I hear myself say
“When I was Young” or “Looking back”
About the way I've led my life.


In that moment, realisation :
A half century of my years
Must stand between the lives we share.


It leaves me breathless and surprised
As here, inside, I feel sixteen.
I still relate to all you do —


Anticipate all you must learn —
But I can see the days grow short
And watch the shadows closing in.                                                                                  




 




IT’S NOT UNUSUAL


Summer’s lasted into Autumn —
some claim that it’s “Climate Change”
but it’s been known through the ages
how there’s warmth in some saint’s days.
Take St. Luke’s “Little Summer”
with its spell of golden days,
or St. Martin’s in November
when warm days can bring a change.


Known in folklore as “Goose Summers” —
this time of year’s for eating goose —
“Gossamer’s” the term contracted
but it has links with more than “Goose”…
In the stubble fields of Autumn
spider’s webs glint in the sun
it’s this gossamer they’re spinning
that is known to everyone.


In a misty drift of drizzle
on a cool October day
we had walked the paths of Summer
under skies that had turned grey;
no birds singing from the hedgerow
and no flowers to be seen —
it’s Gossamer Summer ending
as our Autumn’s weathers change.






 




INTO AUTUMN


A late September burst of sunny days
helps make-believe that Summer’s set to last,
but while the season’s flowers still earn praise
Autumn’s first steps are littering the grass…
Conkers have fallen from horse-chestnut trees,
encouraged by the coldness of the night,
here, spiky chestnut shells beside ash keys –
but not one shiny conker is in sight.


Quite safe on this estate from boy’s attack,
this tree is not beset with sticks and stones –
yet not one conker sits on grass or track–
and empty shells now lie where they were blown…
The only clue – brown fragments I have found –
proves early deer have cleared this patch of ground.






 BLACKTHORN


Our blackthorn has been wonderful this year,
each hedge I passed seemed blanketed in snow.
The trees, like white sails, billowed over lanes
and verges… and the celandines’ bright show.


A gusting wind sprang up to shake the hedge,
bending the trees to rock them to and fro,
releasing blossom in a blizzard fall,
surprising horse and rider just below.


As drifts of snow-white petals filled the lane
the parting clouds revealed a watery sun;
although the signs of Spring were in the air,
the cold wind warned that Winter’s not yet done…


Now, seasons on, the hedge bears blue-black sloes,
As bitter as that wind from long ago.







 IVY


The late September mists are slow to rise
but warming sun brings insects from their rest
made lively by this summer’s slow demise,
they swarm the flowering plant that they like best.
The ivy-covered fence is full of bees
whose season is devoted to these flowers
and many butterflies come here to feed
preparing for their sleep through winter hours.


Below the fence the ground is turning pale –
the pollinator’s work is almost done;
the nectar, insects’ soporific dwale,
assures that berries ripen in late sun
providing winter food for starving birds,
ensuring New Year’s song thrush will be heard.


Dwale – an ancient term for ‘sleeping drought’






    


ROSARY


I watch leaves fall from wind-blown trees,
my children gone, their voices fade;
as memory and light degrades
late birds depart, lost to dark night.


Slowly the nights are drawing in –
times are quiet with less to say
than mornings of those spring-shaped days;
gardens made ready for storms ahead.


The blinds are drawn as lights come on,
books and summers are packed away;
only echoes and ghosts will stay –
each day a prayer to tell like beads.







BLACK DOG


We are not strangers now, black dog.
Others have known you too : slinking
from the shadows, snuffling and thin,
persistent in your following.
Trotting along behind, biding
your time, you are prepared to wait
to seize your opportunity –
cleverly you ingratiate
susceptible hearts, guileless minds.


Shouting never frightened you or
the hex sign. Closing eyes is fine
until, opening them once more,
finds you still here. Deep breathing calms
the mind, but then you sit and whine –
nothing I do makes you disappear.


So finally the bottom line
is knowing that you’re here to stay –
best to ignore you, come what may.
Each cunning sidelong glance reveals
you resting, head on paws today,
or idly sitting scratching fleas –
each time you’re always watching me
with eyes half shut, never asleep :
unwanted friend waits patiently.


Then sometimes, with the longer days,
you leave, abruptly disappear,
and I relax in summer’s sun
and savour this changed atmosphere.
Yet still I know it cannot last
‘though I’ve escaped from time to time,
you’ll suddenly appear, black dog,
and nuzzle me as if you’re mine.


In autumn, with the falling leaves,
you come. When copper sun rests on
the trees I see you gliding through
the wood, knowing, with summer gone,
you’ll seek me out – it’s understood.






















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