If you google poems about Autumn, you will find a theme that runs through most every poem...the slow decline of life as it slinks toward dying. It is very difficult to write about autumn without writing about dying. Along with dying, autumn poems typically lament the loss of summer, the loss of youth, the moonlight (not the sunlight), and the coming of winter.
Well, I love those poems, and I could post a dozen or so (maybe I will), but I don't share those sentiments this year. A year ago, my autumn was filled with pain and a good heaping dose of despair...I laid in bed and watched the leaves fall, and watched the acorns add up on my windowsill to coincide with the number of radiation treatments I had completed, and the sad nights got longer and longer.
NOT THIS AUTUMN. I AM ALL ABOUT THIS AUTUMN. Last autumn was the beginning of an autumn of despair and winter was a winter of desolation. But spring began a spring of healing and summer warmed my bones with a new hope. I am embracing the brisk September days with relish. And I say to winter...BRING IT ON...I'll be ready for you. I absolutely love Autumn. I absolutely (almost completely) love being in this stage of life with all it's transitions. And I'll respond to what I wrote in my last post about the best days being behind me ..."what a bunch of BS, steven, as is your sappy, self-pitying moody wimpiness...get over yourself" I'll take what I have today and stack it up against my coming to life in my freshman year of college 1969, and it's easy to see that today will win hands down.
Autumn...here I am, and I embrace the thought of walking with you for awhile. It's good to be alive. All this pain, these sad emotions, this lonely time or that, this unfulfilled dream, this ticking clock...it's all part of the drama...but listen, there is also a whisper which calls me to undeniable beauty and love and through the autumn wind I hear like never before the gentle call of the One who loves me. And He fills my heart and the compassion and love I feel toward every broken and fragile being just overflows. It runs so deep.
Emily Dickenson... you were kind enough to at least mention the loveliness of Autumn, and even if it is true that for many it is youth that we desperately try to cling to ( I guess, I must confess, at times I find myself amongst that camp)...well, phooey, life's "declivity"(good word!) is just this flesh... at least for today...my spirit is in ascension!!!!!!!!! And cling to Him, and not my youth, shall I!!!
Rock on!
As Summer into Autumn slips
Emily Dickinson
Emily Dickinson
As Summer into Autumn slips
And yet we sooner say
"The Summer" than "the Autumn," lest
We turn the sun away,
And almost count it an Affront
The presence to concede
Of one however lovely, not
The one that we have loved --
So we evade the charge of Years
On one attempting shy
The Circumvention of the Shaft
Of Life's Declivity.
And yet we sooner say
"The Summer" than "the Autumn," lest
We turn the sun away,
And almost count it an Affront
The presence to concede
Of one however lovely, not
The one that we have loved --
So we evade the charge of Years
On one attempting shy
The Circumvention of the Shaft
Of Life's Declivity.
This too is my absolute most favorite succulent I'M ALIVE season... I adore it. I breathe it in. Blessed be God that there are no acorns to line up on the windowsill. Healing is a gift... and when it's time to go Home, may we do so in Joy.
ReplyDeletecontinuing to inspire...you have obviously found itchykoo park in life...embrace the acorns and have a glorious fall on the high plains...will try to do likewise in the hills and hollers of southern IN...Bruce
ReplyDeleteThis is a WONDERFUL autumn! You are healthy and every day brings something new in the changing of the seasons; to embrace the subtle shift in colours as the leaves turn, the smell of woodsmoke in the air, the crunch of winter apples, it's all perfect.
ReplyDeleteOne never has to lose one's youth. It's right in your heart where you left it. Getting truly old is what happens when you forget that tiny voice of youth in your heart, your soul. Age is the "I can't" that makes us sit in silence and watch life flow by. Youth is the "I can!" that makes us get out of the house and walk in the woods, hear the crisp leaves beneath our feet and the sound of geese flying south.
I hear a lot of "I can!" in your writing this autumn. May the days bring only smiles and laughter.