Ode to the Long Awaited November Rain

In a land of endless summer

smoke and dust make brazen air

like a greenhouse glass; a bummer

if we live or sojourn there.

So returning to the moody

places where four seasons roll

and November's bleak and broody

is refreshing to the soul.

Though the air's a long time cleaning,

in the end the scent of rain

gathers to itself the meaning

of refreshment for the brain.

Hail the bleakness of November

onto which we can project

all things tedious to remember

(even those that we elect),

stash provisions in a bunker,

break out quilts and rocking chairs,

gather with our cronies, hunker

round the fire like sleepy bears,

until positively freezing

wind blows in to dissipate

mists of all that's been unpleasing,

and we eagerly await

ice and snow and all December's

round of primal winter-bliss;

sing and dance around the embers,

light the next fire's logs from this.

We can do without November,

some say. Do they say amiss?

Frostless, colorless September

said to us, this year: Remember

winter's own peculiar bliss. 

This poem was suggested by Rosemary Nissen-Wade, who lives where November is a spring month:

https://poetsandstorytellersunited.blogspot.com/2024/11/friday-writings-153-my-cup-runneth-over.html