Tidbits and a poem for fall

Currently listening to: The Cure's Wish album
Reminds me of: Among other things, singing "A Letter to Elise" at the top of my lungs with my friend Gina to our friend Elisa in high school.

Well, it's not officially fall yet, but for the past few days there's been a tiny hint of fall in the air around here. You'd have to be a native southern Californian to sense the subtle difference between summer and fall, but it really is there. I actually got to put on my toe socks the other night! We've begun to sleep under our comforter again instead of just the sheets, and there's a tiny hint of red in the leaves on the liquid amber trees. To celebrate, I made pumpkin bread the other night. Pretty soon it'll be time to break out the Cocteau Twins albums, which I can only listen to in the fall and winter. Weird, huh? I'd love to start playing my Siouxsie and the Banshees Superstition album as well (another fall album, especially the song "The Ghost in You"), but my current copy is wrecked. I think it's cursed or something. I've bought the album three times now, and every time I buy it it gets ruined somehow.

On Saturday night Dave, Becky, Steve, Arla, Zoe, Nathan, and I went to the Hollywood Bowl for the John Williams concert. The evening was almost a disaster, but it worked out. I was in charge of buying the tickets, but the guy at Tower where I bought them gave me tickets for the Friday show instead of Saturday. I didn't notice until the person who scanned our tickets pointed it out. I thought we would have to leave, but a very cool worker named Fernando talked to the ticket office and found us a bunch of seats together, then traded us tickets. So nice of him! The show was pretty good, but there was too much Star Wars music, as usual. Four songs! They did play Schindler's List, which was great, but most of the pieces were the same ones they do every year. I'd love to hear them do some different things, like the theme from Saving Private Ryan, or some things from Catch Me If You Can, some of the lesser known themes. But no matter what the program, Williams is always great, so we had a good time.

And now, a poem to celebrate this month. I wrote this ten years ago, and it's one of my only poems with a rhyme scheme. It's rough and pretty cliche, but I still kind of like it, even though it was about a sad event in my life.

September

The leaves are falling on summer
The world is shedding summer
There's nothing left of summer
But a discarded, tattered dream.

Yesterday the world was bright
With golden light of summer's glow,
Yesterday we played together
Loving each other in friendship strong.
Yesterday our hears were full
Of summer's soul and childhood's dream,
Yesterday the days were long
A carefree song was all we knew.

Today I walked an autumn world,
Late daylight swirled in fading haze.
Today the wind held a bitter note
As summer wrote its first farewell.
Today a coldness touched my face,
Began to erase the summer's warmth,
Today the first frost twisted my heart
And froze the part that once held you.

Summer is gone from my grieving eyes,
Our closeness dies with shortening days.
Your heart is now so far from mine,
Where once entwined there stands just one.
An emptiness comes to consume my life
With all its strife, and you're not there:
I need you now, but I'm all alone,
The bond we've known is far behind.

And now we've reached our summer's end,
The cold sets in and chills me through,
And so, my friend, when all is done,
Your heart is gone at twilight's close.
I watch in silence with slipping tears-
It's lonesome here at the summer's end-
As the brightness pales and darkness falls,
As memories call from the deepening dusk.

The leaves are falling on summer
The world is shedding summer
There's nothing left of summer
But a discarded, tattered dream.

13 September 1995

Still reading? I didn't realize how long it was. Like I said, pretty trite and immature (I have always hated the lines where I rhyme life with strife, how melodramatic!), but it still has a special place in my heart.