Birth of the Year: October 31, 2015

Photo by Josh Schaffer

Racing over the hills in the country the wind blew vast rings of shadow that dwindled again to green. But in London the streets narrowed the clouds; mist hung thick in the East End by the river; made the voices of men crying "Any old iron to sell, any old iron," sound distant; and in the suburbs the organs were muted. The wind blew the smoke--for in every back garden in the angle of the ivy-grown wall that still sheltered a few last geraniums, leaves were heaped up; keen fanged flames were eating them--out into the street, into windows that stood open in the drawing-room in the morning. For it was October, the birth of the year.

The Years (85-6)