This post was originally published 5 years ago on October 22, 2015, and although I’m about a month behind, I wanted to share it again because the poem, a triolet, is one of my favorites. The photo is a favorite, too – it was taken by my friend Aubrey, just up the road from our house. Yes, New Hampshire really IS as beautiful as you’ve heard!
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September Song
The autumn wind is growing colder.
As the hills are set ablaze,
a shiver stirs my neck and shoulder –
the autumn wind is growing colder.
These woods and I, just one month older,
yearn for summer’s sun-drenched days.
The autumn wind is growing colder
as the hills are set ablaze.
– © 2015 Matt Forrest Esenwine, all rights reserved
If you’re looking for some Halloween-themed reading material, might I offer up a list of reading lists that have surfaced across the interwebs? (I admit, they all include Flashlight Night!)
And of course, if you’re looking for more poetry, head on over to the Poetry Friday roundup, which you’ll find at Linda Baie’s blog, Teacher Dance. Linda is celebrating with a pre-Halloween poetry party featuring a poem for the kids and a poem for the grown-ups!
Happy Halloween!
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Coming March 2, 2021! Pre-orders are available!
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I continue adding to my “Wit & Wordplay” videos ! These videos were created for parents and educators (along with their kids) to learn how to write poetry, appreciate it, and have fun with it. From alliteration and iambs to free verse and spine poetry, I’m pretty sure there’s something in these videos you’ll find surprising! You can view them all on my YouTube channel, and if you have young kids looking for something to keep busy with, I also have several downloadable activity sheets at my website.
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You can purchase personalized signed copies of Flashlight Night, (Boyds Mills Press, 2017), Don’t Ask a Dinosaur (Pow! Kids Books, 2018), and nearly ALL of the books or anthologies I’ve been part of!
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Just click the cover of whichever book you want and send the good folks at MainStreet BookEnds in Warner, NH a note requesting the signature and to whom I should make it out to. (alternatively, you can log onto my website and do the same thing) They’ll contact me, I’ll stop by and sign it, and then they’ll ship it! (Plus, you’ll be supporting your local bookseller – and won’t that make you feel good?)
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Thank you to everyone for your support!
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- Positive reviews from Horn Book, School Library Connection, School Library Connection, Booklist, Publisher’s Weekly, and Shelf-Awareness! . .
- “Rollicking rhyme!” – Booklist
- “A wild romp!” – Parenting NH Magazine
- “Cute…intriguing…4 out of 5 stars” – Tulsa Book Review
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Radio, Rhythm & Rhyme 
I like this very much, Matt. The triolet seems like a manageable form!
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Thank you, Diane! It is quite manageable, and lends itself nicely to lyrical lines without the grandness of a pantoume or villanelle.
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This is beautiful! I did feel the chill. I felt like taking the journey and I’m new to the form. It does make me want to try this form out.
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Thank you so much! I’d definitely encourage to take a stab at it. I will warn you, though…the repeating lines may make it seem easier, but the more interesting the rhyme, the better the triolet.
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Love it!
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Thanks, Catherine!
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This is a splendid autumn poem, Matt. It is so visual that it asks for a glowing photo to accompany it for Autumn’s Palette Gallery.
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I might see if I can find one, Carol…thank you!
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I just wrote my first triolet. I think they look much easier than they actually are.
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Indeed! As I mentioned to Myra, the repeating line makes it look simpler than it is – but the trick is to find an unusual rhyme that you can work with, and make it all blend seamlessly. Hope we get to see yours!
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Lovely and lyrical. Once again, a hint of Frost: “These woods and I”. There must be something special in that New England air. 🙂
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Thank you, Jama, I appreciate that! There is something special here, that’s for sure. (You should visit sometime!)
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This is gorgeous, Matt. I’m generally not a fan of triolets, but I love this one!
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Thank you so much, Michelle!
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Your revisions have certainly paid off, Matt This is beautiful! You make me want to try a triolet.
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Oh, thank you so much! Definitely take the challenge!
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“triolet”–thanks to you, that’s an intriguingly new poem form to play with–or as I’m watching the Jets, to “tackle.” Thanks for introducing…I like your camaraderie/identification with the woods, both being one month older. God bless you.
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Thanks, I’m glad you liked it! As a Pats fan, my condolences to your team…I have a number of friends who are Jets fans, too! I do hope you’ll ‘tackle’ the triolet form sometime, and be sure to let me know when you do!
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Thanks for the condolences, though I wish I were offering them to you! …I definitely will put a “triolet” into my poetry playbook–perhaps as an option:) God bless you! THANKS!
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You may want to call up special teams for that one!
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🙂 …Jets & Mets. You wouldn’t be rooting for the Royals, would you? Hope not!
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Triolet is one of my favorite forms. I love the way that it makes a box — a little gift — out of the poem. My favorite line is: “These woods and I, just one month older,”
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Yep, that picture is very scary, Matt. Happy Halloween, whatever you & the kids cook up together. And I’m sure you will do something fun! I’m glad you shared this again. This triolet is lovely, so nostalgic for beautiful autumn! I love “These woods and I, just one month older,” – just perfect.
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Thank you so much, Linda! We’re planning a little party for the 2 kids here at the house, in lieu of trick-or-treating, with a scavenger hunt, bobbing for apples, and that sort of thing. They’re looking forward to it…although my wife isn’t a big fan of the mullet. 😀
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I love triolets! They sound so neat and tidy when read aloud. I’ve also had fun trying to write them, but as you have pointed out, that is not always easy.
The picture complements the poem so well –
The autumn wind is growing colder
as the hills are set ablaze.
Stay safe!
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Thanks so much, Rose! I’m glad you liked it.
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Beautiful triolet poem, thank you! Makes me feel the autumn chill. Today the high here will only be 33 and most of our leaves are off the trees…
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Thanks so much, Yvona! Today we woke up to an inch and a half of snow, so things are definitely getting colder around here.
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Lovely to read this triolet again (and what a GORGEOUS photo). As for that last photo of the guy in the mullet . . . *runs away screaming* 😀
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Ha, I knew I’d get a scream out of someone! 😉 Thanks, Jama.
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Look at this! So many came in 2015 to congratulate you and now and now some of us are returning. I love this poem and the glorious shades of autumn, Matt.
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Thanks so much, Carol…if I find a photo I think might be appropriate, I’ll send it along for your next autumn gallery!
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Your September Song perfectly describes my October day (I guess NH speeds up the seasons!)
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Ha, we do – peak foliage was a couple of weeks ago! Thanks, Buffy.
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Lovely, Matt – I enjoy reading and writing triolets as well. Smiled at the notion of you/the narrator and the woods (and all of us) being a “month older” – and now, of course, years older… time flies through all the seasons!
Happy Halloweening!
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And time flies much faster, the older we get! Thanks, Robyn.
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I really like the poem, and the way you play with the cold and the fire.
Ruth, thereisnosuchthingasagodforsakentown.blogspot.com
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Thanks, Ruth – I did enjoy the dichotomy.
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I love poems with repetition and in this one, those repeated lines help us feel chill of fall, and see the hills on fire.
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Thanks so much, Janice! The repetition really adds to the musicality of the poem, which I like.
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So much hinges on the choice of repeated line in a triolet. Yours is perfect as is the photo that accompanies it. Feeling the chill encroaching here in Maine…
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Indeed, I’m sure the chill has set in by now up there! Thanks, Molly.
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