This week I was assigned to a 9th-grade 'Week Without Walls' trip to Harrachov, a ski-resort village not far from our own cottage in the Krkenose Mountains on the Polish border. The trip was fine--no injuries in the rope-climbing, archery, other-things-that-could-happen, and along the way I enjoyed a small conversation concerning the way Czechs label these present months (August=srpen, September=září October=říjen). Those who come to visit us can find out more;)
I thought of calling this post/poem "září", but instead retracted to our Irish heritage and the positive vibes of its most famous blessing. It has leanings to Frost and Eliot and Shakespeare, but deeper claim to the phenomenology that Brno-born philosopher Husserl esteemed, namely: our own (rather awesome) experience.
A Czech Blessing
September in our local language glows,
anticipates the rutting season, knows
the antics of a summer cut and dried,
scans the stack of wood an errant winter tried,
and hums ‘there will be time’ to reinstate.
For pessimists, no failure is in sight;
for boundless minds, the running air is right
and gateways of fresh learning stay ajar.
We do not cringe to catch a shooting star,
but rather chase the chance to calculate.
Admittedly, all autumns come too fast,
coupling the innocence and bombast
of adolescent dreams. September brings
a stage to strut and fret, a bell that rings
good tidings to the frames by which we learn.
In ways I’m entering Grade Forty-Three
—such graduations have eluded me—
and no voice mocks why
chop that wood again?
Maybe fatherhood defends, smiling when
we let September glow, perchance to burn.
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