At a bit of a loss for words to express the feel of the transition into fall, I draw upon a source recently brought to my attention by an aunt – who is a bona fide naturalist! She has introduced me to a book by Donald Culross Peattie, entitled An Almanac For Moderns. The book was published in 1935 and is a daily journal of observations of nature and its ways.
Here is the first paragraph of Mr. Peattie’s entry for October 1:
“Now the autumn colors march upon their triumphs. So still the woods stand, against the faultless blue of the sky, they seem like windows dyed with pigments meant to represent all the riches and display the history – pointed windows blazing with trumpeting angels, blazons and heraldic glitter, intricate, leaf-twined illumination, depth of holy gold within temporal scarlet, soft gleaming chalices encrusted with ruby and topaz, cloths of bronze and ells of green, embroideries of crimson, twists from the vats of saffron and Tyrian and fustian.”
A day comes, sometimes before the actual turn of the season on the calendar, when one tiny hint announces the fall. It might be a subtle dulling of the colors, or one striking, dramatic leaf upon the ground.
Hues of gold, orange, and red trade away summer’s brilliant green.
All of a sudden, a growth looks to be out of place, when in fact it’s the same old shrub, in the same old place, but with a new tint.
A sight catches your eye and you wonder how you’ve not taken note of the shape of the leaves or the cascade of the branches till now.
And, colorful berries crop up all around, like Peattie’s ‘encrusted with rubies and topaz’.
There’s no turning back, the fall is here.
SilverLining 