Autumn Leaves #3

Mostly I come up with my own titles.  Today, I’m just jumping on the bandwagon.

Autumn Leaves the Elder (first to penetrate my consciousness) is the latest post from unironedman, a blog you should absolutely be reading. If you’re not yet subscribed, that italicized bit is a link, so go do yourself a favor.  In fact, as the Autumn Leaves post is a slight departure from his usual, do yourself another favor and read the witty and delightful About the Unironedman page (italicized = link, EZ PZ).

Autumn Leaves the Younger (came into my life a couple days later) is actually Autumn’s Leaves, and I’ll get to it in a sec.  Suffice it to say, I took the near-exact reiteration of the phrase as a message from the universe.

Which brings me to my Autumn Leaves —Autumn Leaves #3.  Ah, the glorious colors of the season!

Oh, wait.  Red, orange, yellow, brown, a touch of purple, a touch of green … all autumn colors, but these ain’t leaves.  They’re little bubbles of color-coded air quality.  Welcome to smoky California.

Relax.  We’re not on fire here in Sonoma.  Not at the moment, anyway.  We’re just suffering a nasty wind shift that’s blowing the smoke from fires in California’s far north and southern Oregon this-a-way.

It’s a bummer, because when it gets like this (the new autumnal “normal”), we’re advised to stay indoors if possible, and doing anything remotely energetic — like practicing kung fu on the deck or taking the dog for a walk — is a ba-a-a-ad idea.

Makes me particularly sad, because the autumnal equinox, aka Mabon, is my favorite holiday of the solar year.

It used to be Samhain.  And don’t get me wrong — I still love Samhain!  Far and away the most magical of the Sabbats!  But as, over time and for a host of reasons, designing, engineering, and conducting big-ish Samhain rituals became trickier, our old covens and circles dispersed, and the kids moved away, the wild revels of the Wiccan New Year evolved into a far cozier and tamer celebration.

Still, it might have retained top slot if the celebration could have remained a family affair.  Samhain is the Feast of the Dead, where we party with our ancestors.  Best-case scenario, it won’t be all that long till I’m partying with my ancestors on a regular basis … but even so, I would tots be down for an hours-long feast where we fill the younger generations’ ears with the juiciest bits of their forebears’ histories, tell them tales of our own misguided pasts they’ve heard a thousand times before, and perhaps surprise them with a tale they’ve never heard because we only just remembered it ourselves as our short-term memories wane and long-dormant synapses momentarily and unexpectedly fire in our brains.

But, alas, while the social calendar of the Western World allows for family gatherings at Thanksgiving (don’t get me started) and Christmas (not MY winter festival), it isn’t nearly flexible enough to make Samhain family gatherings a thing.

Now Samhain’s luster has slightly dimmed, Mabon’s wonders shine more brightly.  The quality of the light of an autumn afternoon, rich and golden, stirs my heart.  Where summer’s heat persisted, even the warmest autumn day must yield to the ever-earlier onset of night.  Hereabouts, the figs and olives are getting serious, apples and plums have come into their own, squirrels are squirreling away the fat-rich nuts, the wine grapes are nearly ready for the crush … 

For me, this station of the sun — the heart of the harvest season — this is Thanksgiving Day.

Which brings me back to Autumn’s Leaves the Younger.  I am thankful entirely that this poem dropped into my lap.  I loved it from the start.  By the end I knew I had to share it with all of you.

A Year’s Time

I stood amid the crowd at vintners’ stalls,

and willed those throngs to yield me up

some image of your cherished face

so sorely-missed and though but rarely seen                                         

in these more latter days,

Yet even now when glimpsed in my minds-eye

or in the true and open air,

the recognition still o’erwhelms of seeing, truly seeing who you are

and you gaze back at me, the selfsame recognition in your eyes.

A year’s gone by, you say? All in a glance,

the earth’s turned round but once

mid clouds and shadows, brilliant sun and rain,

so autumn’s leaves beguile us once again.

JAJ (9-24-2011)