Readers of Folkpotpourri know well enough how the autumn affects this writer, so kick back and enjoy (hopefully) some seasonal thoughts from the late October Ozarks.
As new dawn ripens grey through rain-soaked autumnal branches sway silently within great oaken copses, brown acorns fly across ocher carpets of fallen leaves, carried by determined squirrels to hiding places in secretive locations known only to them. The irascible crow speaks in his ebony tongue of approaching winds with icy fingers in the offing. Grey, solemn fog blankets the hollow, weaving shrouds of stories told in northern climes among the innocence of greenery yet upon watchful oak trees. Branches and boughs who have yet to be warned of the seasonal evolution, thus still cloaked in summer apparel are taken aback at the tall hickories who have indeed heard the rumor of autumn and now speak in extravagant golden verses of their own. Indeed, the oaks are still green, but whispers can now be heard among their great boughs of an imminent change in the air – of brown and copper gilded leaves among their kind.
The loudest dirges of the forest of late are black gum trees who once more don their extravagant scarlet dress and sing crimson dirges of colder times to come. Poison ivy vines clinging tightly to the yet verdant white oak trees and harmonize with the ornate gum in their own composition of color of autumn song. The dry streambed of the placid south hollow begins now to come dampened with ever searching raindrops, soon to be murmuring her much practiced and timely addition to the cacophony of this year’s ringing symphony of fall.
A blackberry stalk with withered leaves stands sadly along the trail, despondent at the approach of another autumn and showing copper and red colors of his plight upon the carpet of fallen grasses. His task now will be to keep his composure and endure until warmer days of bees and flowers when he can make his own blossoms. Ragged remnants of spider webs whose creators have now retired into dark shelters of fallen decay, undulate and glisten with clinging moisture from the incessant grim fog.
The blue jay can be heard now offering his gratitude for abundant juniper berries as he flits from branch to branch; tiny chickadees crowd among dancing ocher grasses and shrubs seeking minute morsels of seed. Thistles stand in overgrown fields holding court and waving darkened leaves while singing in the wet breeze – a song heard mostly by the goldfinches and indigo buntings, who crowd among them and harken to their oratory for which they find reward of sustenance. The Creator once more provides for all.
On this foggy, silent morning of grey, which creeps among the cattails and willow boughs, and betides the arrival of a new season of cold and damp, hummingbirds have left for more amenable climes. The red bird has chosen, as always, to remain among the trees and shrubs and continue their songs. They know this world needs their music through the cold season ahead. All of God’s creatures have made their choices of how they will endure – many will not, but when spring returns, there will be new ones to take their places.
Happy Autumn y’all and keep yourselves warm.
God bless all.
MK