Autumn of Discontent

Zaka

In a deathlike stillness only rustle of autumnal leaves was heard as cold wind ran over whispering that winter’s frigidness is here. 

“The fall has gone too soon”, mused I as I turned and sauntered down the empty street. Fallen leaves squeaked under my feet as if solemnity of evening was being offended. Having walked a kilometer down the familiar path, I stopped. 

“Why does discontentment have to be the part of autumn?”, as this strange thought presented itself, I shrugged with an audible exhalation. 

“What can I say?”, I murmured as if the question came from someone else instead of voices in my head. I’m so fond of confusing my mind by dwelling on eerie thoughts that often excite my imagination.

The fall is mature and solemn. No wonder Henry Ward Beecher wrote: 

“October is nature’s funeral month. Nature glories in death more than life. The month of departure is more beautiful than the month of coming – October than May. Evergreen thin loves to die in bright colors.”

Gloom is synonymous with autumn, and yet, it is my favorite time of the year. When you look at the maples, you can sense as if silence listening to silence. Then I understand the true meaning of George Eliot’s words:

“Delicious Autumn! My very soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird. I would fly about the earth seeking the successive autumn”, said she.

Autumn returns but with a bit of discontent

Zaka

"Then summer fades and passes and October comes.  We'll smell smoke then, and feel an unexpected sharpness, a thrill of nervousness, swift elation, a sense of sadness and departure."   Thomas Wolfe

In a nice cool evening of September,  I walked along the edge of the stream, the leaves whisper the sound of past and the wild air reveals the arrival of autumn. I don’t know why some people call it “sad season”, may be they think, the year is dying but I love fall. 
With skies a deeper blue, and nights that become suddenly clear and chilled, I love fall  because of the smells that it speaks of. I don’t know why Poet like Faiz Ahmed Faiz cursed this time of the year  in his poetry..

“This is the way that autumn came to the trees:

it stripped them down to the skin,

left their ebony bodies naked.

It shook out their hearts, the yellow leaves,

scattered them over the ground.

Anyone could trample them out of shape

undisturbed by a single moan of protest.

The birds that herald dreams

were exiled from their song,

each voice torn out of its throat.

They dropped into the dust

even before the hunter strung his bow.

Oh, God of May have mercy.

Bless these withered bodies

with the passion of your resurrection;

make their dead veins flow with blood again.

Give some tree the gift of green again.

Let one bird sing”

My be the poet narrated the half truth about autumn, because everything is half dead. The wind moves like a cripple among the leaves. But there is another way of seeing.  Seeing with the eye of memory, there is colours everywhere, the winds will blow their own freshness into you, and your sorrow will drop way like the leaves of trees. I sit quietly, listening to the falling leaves and wishing miseries of my land vapours like the faded memories….