Meditation on the Season
I used to go on walking tours, but there came a time when I couldn’t manage the
challenging walks, but I could go a couple of slow miles over flat territory if there was a
pub at the end of the journey. I’d take a pen and a notebook because they helped me see
and remember. So here –
Keswick, There and Back
The Squire strutting down the drive? – No, a partridge off for a stroll.
stone fence; moss; sharp, stiff holly leaves; soft drape of cedar, a still life.
Triplets: Lady in brown, black, white walks between two collies.
The dropped pound chings against the bar’s brass footrail.
“Autumn, Autumn, Autumn, Autumn,” an old drunk murmurs to his pint.
Bored tall blonde on high heels, smoke in one hand, drink in the other.
Eight black cows in a line hurrying towards an forgotten open gate.
Beneath dappled cloud masses – a jet’s double streak.
On all sides, mountains. They don’t look down.
This was written years ago. The year I live in now has long ago turned and heads
inward towards the solstice, and, later, my 85th birthday. I’ve just begun to understand
the old man in the pub talking to his pint of bitter, “Autumn, Autumn, Autumn, Autumn.”
BIO: Nils Peterson is Professor Emeritus at San Jose State University where he taught in the English and Humanities Departments. He has published poetry, science fiction, and articles on subjects as varying as golf and Shakespeare, has had several chapbooks and two collections of poetry published the latest in 2011, A Walk to the Center of Things, a memoir, Talk in the Reading Room in 2014, and Earth,Fire, Water, Air in collaboration with Lorraine Capparell, a water colorist in 2015. In 2009, he was chosen to be the first Poet Laureate of Santa Clara County.
If you can, please consider donating to this all volunteer online journal.
Thank you.
https://wanderlust-journal.submittable.com/submit/130202/donate
Wanderlust 