A Poem by Sarah Doyle

I, Autumn

I know they dread my coming, and am hurt by it.  I cannot help what I am, what I am not.  There is, within me, a burnished fragility.  I am quiet in my approach, deceptively tentative.  A stealthy guest is not always a welcome guest.  I bring a season of harvest more meaningful than the blossoms of my showy cousin, Summer -- but still, I am resented.  Despised for what I herald -- darkness, cold, hopelessness -- I am the anti-Persephone, the fall of leaves, the closing of doors and hearts.

Sarah Doyle is the Pre-Raphaelite Society's Poet-in-Residence.  She has been widely placed and published, with her first collection, "Dreaming Spheres:  Poems of the Solar System" (co-written with Allen Ashley), being published by PS Publishing in Autumn 2014.  Sarah co-hosts Rhyme & Rhythm Jazz-Poetry Club at Enfield's Dugdale Theatre.  More at:  www.sarahdoyle.co.uk