Ode to Autumn

Winter's cold is beginning to be upon us and the land. Fall's bright plumage is shedding into bright piles and puddles on the darkening ground. For the past few days, dark and omnious clouds hovered low in the sky, as the leaves shiver and shake, knowing their time is almost up. Before, an indian summer was here, with bright sun and warm temperatures, giving us one last, warm embrace to be carried on into the dark, cold of Winter. Now, we hunker down, we store up, and we wait. Like all animals, we prepare for the long days ahead. Cutting, splitting, and stacking wood. Raking leaves into piles to then burn them on crisp nights. Canning, freezing, and drying the last of the garden's bounty. And if I were more industrious, maybe knitting one last scarf, mitten set, or hat. Already the Winter comforter is on our bed.

The sun sets early. Though there are no less hours in the day, it seems there is less time to do anything but eat and sleep. And just like the animals, the sun sleeps in, reluctant to get up and cast off the cozy blanket of night. Soon, the silvery moon will greet me when I leave work and when I wake in the morning. Even Kai, our dog, sleeps until the sun has finally risen. If only I could follow my internal pining and confound the regulations of the work a day world. How odd to think that not all people experience this simultaneous darkening of the world and the spirit. To imagine other citizens in California basking in sunshine. South Carolinians wading at the shore. This rhythm of seasons feels more natural than those preternaturally bright, sunny places, more honest. Life is a cycle, it starts off warm and soft and bright and ends with a lessening, a slowing, a need to curl inward.

At night, the air is chilled. It is as though the air is a transparent window to see more clearly how very small my life is, Earth is, and how vast and unending is the universe. Looking up into the night sky, the stars hover, some alive some dead, and suddenly I see into the Milky Way, into the depths of that unendingness. Alone? How could we even think we're big enough to proclaim there is nothing else out there? Out in the unending place we can only just try to name, describe, and understand? But even these questions do not matter as the stars shine on, sweep across the sky in their seasonal paths.

In the morning the sun sparkles on a silvery coat of frost, covering everything. Shoes slide over the slick surface, leaving a trail of broken blades and frostlessness behind. I have to put on a hat before venturing out with Kai. The sound of geese flying south finally echoes across the space between them and I. They leave, always to return.