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Micha Boyett

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Nostalgia: End of Summer, Week 1 of Austin

Nostalgia: End of Summer, Week 1 of Austin

Last updated on: August 12, 2011 at 12:01 am by Micha Boyett Hohorst

Nostalgia: End of Summer, Week 1 of Austin 2011-08-12T00:01:45-07:00 Micha Boyett Hohorst

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It’s been one whole week since I began life as a Austin-dweller. So far, I have been really hot, gone swimming every day, spent lots of nap-time looking for a preschool, eaten out (way too much), and have seen my bestie Jamie (and her almost 2-week old!) twice. Tomorrow, I have a real-live new friend date that I’m pumped about.

The days are getting shorter; school is approaching. And I always feel a little emotional when summer begins to close shop. So, in honor of my 1 week milestone, and my love for summertime nostalgia, I’ll let my favorite Jane Kenyon use her words. She always says exactly what I’m feeling:

Three Songs at the End of Summer

By Jane Kenyon 1947–1995

A second crop of hay lies cut

and turned. Five gleaming crows

search and peck between the rows.

They make a low, companionable squawk,

and like midwives and undertakers

possess a weird authority.

Crickets leap from the stubble,

parting before me like the Red Sea.

The garden sprawls and spoils.

Across the lake the campers have learned

to water ski. They have, or they haven’t.

Sounds of the instructor’s megaphone

suffuse the hazy air. “Relax! Relax!”

Cloud shadows rush over drying hay,

fences, dusty lane, and railroad ravine.

The first yellowing fronds of goldenrod

brighten the margins of the woods.

Schoolbooks, carpools, pleated skirts;

water, silver-still, and a vee of geese.

The cicada’s dry monotony breaks

over me. The days are bright

and free, bright and free.

Then why did I cry today

for an hour, with my whole

body, the way babies cry?

A white, indifferent morning sky,

and a crow, hectoring from its nest

high in the hemlock, a nest as big

as a laundry basket …

In my childhood

I stood under a dripping oak,

while autumnal fog eddied around my feet,

waiting for the school bus

with a dread that took my breath away.

The damp dirt road gave off

this same complex organic scent.

I had the new books—words, numbers,

and operations with numbers I did not

comprehend—and crayons, unspoiled

by use, in a blue canvas satchel

with red leather straps.

Spruce, inadequate, and alien

I stood at the side of the road.

It was the only life I had.

Source: Poetry (September 1988).

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Nostalgia: End of Summer, Week 1 of Austin

Three Songs at the End of Summer

Jane Kenyon, “Three Songs at the End of Summer” from Collected Poems. Copyright © 2005 by the Estate of Jane Kenyon.

Who said: "Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in"?