In deep crenelated crimson,
Autumn arrives in regal robes.
Her boisterous blue burgundy
surging with violent carmine.
Autumn arrives in regal robes
carpeting the earth with fractured
parquet of mismatched, misshaped shards-
a luscious ramollescence.
Her boisterous blue burgundy
cape blusters with bolstered boldness
as she whips the wind to climax
and She reigns as queen for the day.
Surging with violent carmine,
capped rivers rage with Her breath
and rains fall relentlessly as
She settles in for the long night.
*Retourne format: four quatrains, eight syllables each line, written with a tumbling refrain. The lines of the first stanza provide an opening refrain for the ensuing stanzas. xABC Axxx Bxxx Cxxx. Unrhymed.
CXXX
From dreamlike life I to this nightmare wake
Who prayed not God my barren soul to take
Amused was I of that which is at stake
Refused thy truth my selfish will to break
In this my guilt if only I may sweat
To quench my thirst and yet would never get
To drink that fount I scorned before my death
Thy every word, in hell would not forget
Forever damned that I may rest desire
Tis always night in this eternal fire
For I had thought thy way is much too dire
Until the day my poor lost soul require
These worms regenerate for I am not
The word of truth, O please give heed and thought
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