A mackerel sky of linen-light and ribbon-shade did bathe the merry aeronauts; and on that first day of autumn the dawn was birdsong-bathed. A dawn of pumpkin blush was ebbing as the air carried a misty-haze. And so the hills and sky took on a sepia mellowness, as if it was a yesteryear photograph of a hundred years plus a day. This was how that September drew breath, how it came to be in that memorable year. Others may speak of dates and times - for me it was a moment of light-ribbons and linen-shade; it was when seasons and reasons melted to reform.

September 2026

 

I’d chewed on summer as hush-a-bye gum until the flavour was so long gone. The heat wall had gone brick by brick, and the ice of winter was yet a far away fret. Autumn had clocked in for its first day, brighter than a punk’s renegade rock-pet. The air was coffee with a side of toast, perhaps a danish too. Then in the light that wasn’t so bright, and neither was it dim, as a passing bus thrashed its engine too hard, I saw the door of The Light Brigade, the remnants of the three hundred. Upon it was a fresh pack of gum nailed into old paint that peeled and a note… A note addressed to me. “It’s about time you showed up.”

September 2026

 

Autumn shrugged beneath a fickle fog, first day or not, it was limping hard. It seemed that summer had kicked its shins then done a runner with day one’s heat-kitty. Not a penny of heat was abroad in the sky, impoverished the birds huffed not a note, yet clung to their twigs as a misery-mute mob. It seemed the new season was a feet-dragging slob, dumping its leaves, sky as glum as can be. Clouds rolled in only to sink lower. Wasn’t it all supposed to be flame trees and hearth cocoa? Is there a complaint department for Fall falling with a gloam-glower? What happens when you expect a gold-scarlet sky party and you get smog-mold? 

September 2026