As we made our daily trip to Penticton today, up through the valley bottom where the trees are still brilliant with autumn shades, we climbed to higher altitudes where a strong wind has thinned the leaves on the deciduous tree and in some cases scattered all the ground beneath them with gold.
At the highest point of the pass the beautiful bones of the alder and aspen are filagree lace, silhouetted against the darkness of the evergreen hills.
I was reminded of Mary Oliver and her beautiful "Lines Written in the Days of Growing Darkness".
Every year we have been
witness to it: how the
world descends
into a rich mash, in order that
it may resume.
And therefore
who would cry out
to the petals on the ground
to stay
knowing as we must,
how the vivacity of what was is married
to the vitality of what will be?
I don't say it's easy, but
what else will do
if the love one claims to have for the world
be true?
So let us go on, cheerfully enough,
this and every crisping day.
though the sun be swinging east,
and the ponds be cold and black,
and the sweets of the year be doomed.
And I thought about how these words are so relevant to the November of our lifetime