October is my favourite month. Seeing this little hill in a local park with its brightly coloured trees reminded me of a poem by Canadian poet Bliss Carman. This poem, A Vagabond Song, was originally published in 1896 and while some of its language would be considered inappropriate today, its sentiment still hits home to me.
A Vagabond Song
There is something in the autumn that is native to my blood—
Touch of manner, hint of mood;
And my heart is like a rhyme,
With the yellow and the purple and the crimson keeping time.
The scarlet of the maples can shake me like a cry
Of bugles going by
And my lonely spirit thrills
To see the frosty asters like a smoke upon the hills.
There is something in October sets the gypsy blood astir;
We must rise and follow her,
When from every hill of flame
She calls, and calls each vagabond by name.
