
Everybody loves a good reading so each month I will be introducing a poem and a book with the title -name of a month. Let’s begin with….
‘September’, Lucy Maud Montgomery
Lo! a ripe sheaf of many golden days
Gleaned by the year in autumn’s harvest ways,
With here and there, blood-tinted as an ember,
Some crimson poppy of a late delight
Atoning in its splendor for the flight
Of summer blooms and joys
This is September.
(Montgomery (1874-1942) is best-known for her classic novel for children, Anne of Green Gables, set in Montgomery’s own country of Canada (on Prince Edward Island). But Montgomery was also a poet, and in this short poem about September (quoted above in its entirety) she pays tribute to the ‘late delight’ of the month.)
The brilliant bestseller by the much-loved Rosamunde Pilcher. As spring comes to Scotland and the hills burst into life, a dance is planned for September. The invitations summon home the group of people Violet Aird has cared for most in her long life. The oldest, strongest and wisest of them all, she sees Alexa, her vulnerable granddaughter, find love for the first time, while the decision to send her little grandson away to school is driving parents Edmund and Virginia even further apart. Far from them all is Pandora, the glamorous, exciting girl who ran away twenty years before. All will converge on Scotland this September, bringing their stories with them. A story of homecomings and heartbreaks, friendships, betrayals, forgiveness, and love.
October
BY ROBERT FROST
O hushed October morning mild,
Thy leaves have ripened to the fall;
Tomorrow’s wind, if it be wild,
Should waste them all.
The crows above the forest call;
Tomorrow they may form and go.
O hushed October morning mild,
Begin the hours of this day slow.
Make the day seem to us less brief.
Hearts not averse to being beguiled,
Beguile us in the way you know.
Release one leaf at break of day;
At noon release another leaf;
One from our trees, one far away.
Retard the sun with gentle mist;
Enchant the land with amethyst.
Slow, slow!
For the grapes’ sake, if they were all,
Whose leaves already are burnt with frost,
Whose clustered fruit must else be lost—
For the grapes’ sake along the wall.
In this poem, the American-born poet Robert Frost (1874-1963) considers the state of nature on an October morning, asking that nature beguile him and his fellow humans into believing things are not hastily moving to a state of waste and ruin by slowing down the process of decay and demise that October brings, with the falling leaves and harsh winds.
The runaway international No.1 bestseller that launched Tom Clancy’s spectacular career and introduced his acclaimed hero, Jack Ryan, in the ultimate submarine adventure. Silently, beneath the chill Atlantic waters, Russia’s ultra-secret missile submarine, the Red October, is heading west. The Americans want her. The Russians want her back. With all-out war only seconds away, the superpowers race across the ocean on the most desperate mission of a lifetime. The most incredible chase in history is on… The Hunt for Red October… the classic story of a spellbinding battle of nerves, above and below the waves, unrivalled in its authenticity and breath-stopping suspense.