October, 2000 Monthly Feature : Each month I have been putting together some of my favourites to share with you. Archives
Brilliant Circles
Adorned in a scarlet gown, a coat of magenta, petticoats in every shade green, a scarf daubed with brilliant coral, and more gold than any lady would consider proper in daytime, the coquette Autumn arrived today. Her provocative scent, some heady combination of woodsmoke and cedar, cinnamon and the tangy bite of carnations, promises all sorts of exotic adventures. Her warm end-of-summer days and frigid nights alternately bath us in contentment and leave us searching her cold starlit eyes for signs of winter's inexorable advance. A sultry temptress, she flirts wantonly with everyone she meets. She will stop here for only a moment, catch our eyes, and then begin her undulating stride across the landscape. Town and country, plain and mountain, all fall under her spell. In conquering, she caresses them with a brilliant artist's palette, leaving no nook or crevice untouched. Our thirsty eyes drink her in as she begins a slow striptease; shedding her brilliant garments and letting her auburn hair fall.
Is it any wonder that consumptive poets fell in love with her? That fevered flush, the frenetic pace, the breath of musty sickbed scent; perhaps these signs alerted them to a kindred spirit. Of her we might say 'she burns the candle at both ends', but we can forgive her this excess. A light so short-lived must necessarily flare the brighter, and, after all, Matron Winter will soon take her in hand. It won't be long until her hair fades to a more sedate nut brown, and her crimson cheek pales into the wan days of November.
Today though, she dances in brilliant circles around us all.
K.M.G.
A Vagabond SongThere is something in the autumn that is native to my blood - Touch of manner, hint of mood; And my heart is like a rhyme. With the yellow and the purple and the crimson keeping time. The scarlet of the maples can shake me like a cry Of bugles going by. And my lonely spirit thrills To see the frosty asters like smoke upon the hills. There is something in October sets the gypsy blood astir; We must rise and follow her, When from every hill of flame She calls and calls each vagabond by name. Bliss Carman |
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