Fall

I love fall, it is an inspiring season.  It's also a busy season.  I've felt such a pull to stop. To sit down under a beautiful tree and watch the leaves float around me.  To write and to create art. 

But it's been so busy.  I've been focused on school and education and getting from one place to the next, and then getting pulled into the trap of believing that the couch is the only recharging station.  I fear this Indian Summer will pass by unappreciated.

I would love to post pictures of some of the incredible scenes I've taken part in this fall - an incredible pink sunset over White Bear Lake, a moment watching Marley sitting still on a bed of leaves in a fall garden scene, a walk along the Mississippi - but I have misplaced my camera.  I'm sure it will appear sometime, but it's been frustrating not to have it.  In lieu of a picture I'll turn to Claire Malroux and a poem of her's that I loved a couple years ago.

In October

October its brilliance
In its arms
     the condemned leaves
     the obsession
with dying beautifully

Whorls of more carnal
     flowers
and regal silhouettes which purify themselves
     at the borders
     in the reachieved rigor of gardens

Birds shriek across
transparencies

Engraved in the actual
in the insubstantial
     grooves
the mechanism cannot fail
even if human gestures
come undone

The obstinate
light
imposes loving hands
upon the cold

Translated from French by Marilyn Hacker