october stops the pretence that somehow summer should still be loitering around it walks through the garden hanging the spiders up between fences and flowers it throws rather more dew on the ground than is good for the shoes and then has the nerve to let on frost is sniffing its way southwards - some mornings it can be caught at the windows looking in with a shrug it's spotted a shiver or two hankering in shadows for the heat-switch - all's on the shift inwards - colours bunch into their deeper shades here's where the year gets used to growing older and for the first time with nowhere desperate to go (and nothing to prove) admits what it is and strolls in a blithe sort of way towards all hallows