Autumn, or "fall" as it is called in the USA, often arouses feelings of loss and melancholy. However, in his ode To Autumn, John Keats, the great poet of the early nineteenth century whose own life was so brief, the end of summer is not a cause for sadness but for celebration, of the wonderful fruitfulness of nature on the brink of decay.
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After reading the poem, do a comprehension activity and a vocabulary activity. Then try some writing yourself.
I
Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,
Close bosom friend of the maturing sun,
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run:
To bend with apples the mossed cottage-trees,
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core;
To swell the gourd, and plump the hazel shells
With a sweet kernel; to set budding more,
And still more, later flowers for the bees,
Until they think warm days will never cease,
For summer has o'er-brimmed their clammy cells.
II
Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store?
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may find
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor,
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind;
Or on a half-reaped furrow sound asleep,
Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook
Spares the next swath and all its twinèd flowers;
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep
Steady thy laden head across a brook;
Or by a cyder-press, with patient look,
Thou watchest the last oozings hours by hours.
III
Where are the songs of spring? Aye, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast music too -
While barrèd clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue.
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The red-breast whistles from the garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.
John Keats
How does Keats' view of autumn compare with your own? Make a list of the good things he describes. Do they happen in your own world? Can you make your own list of good things of autumn that please you - or, if you prefer, bad things that don't please you! Then try and make a poem out of them, bringing out their effect on the five senses. Send us your poem.
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