Wake Up Call

Fall

“the black oaks

fling their bronze fruit

into all the pockets of the earth

pock pock

they knock against the thresholds

the roof the sidewalk

fill the eaves

the bottom line

of the old gold song

of the almost finished year...”
Mary Oliver (excerpt from "Fall" Poetry, 1994)

Have you noticed that there is a difference in the light in autumn? Something happens when the sun moves below the equator that causes a golden glow to clasp the earth in the northern hemisphere. It's almost like a beautiful child that does not want to leave it's mother. I love this light.

The black oaks outside my porch are once again reminding me why I put a roof over it. Acorns crack like bullets on the pavement of my driveway and on the metal roof across the way. Soon my drive will be covered in them. When I arrived home from the lake, I noticed for the first time that leaves are already falling, without color change, without notice—just brown leaves on the grass. Once Autumn crosses the threshold, she announces her presence in all the time-honored ways.

This year has seen dramatic changes in the the climate, some of them disastrous. Here in Alabama, summer has been unusually temperate, cooler than normal, wetter than normal. Maybe just an unusual year, maybe a trend—who knows. Four churning Category 4 or 5 storms at once in the Caribbean and Gulf is something I can't remember seeing before, but perhaps I haven't paid close enough attention. Over 100 wildfires burning more than 7.1 million acres in our Western states seems excessive, but who can say.

Mother Earth is stirred up; she will put us in our place without the slightest regard for what we believe or don't believe. While we are fussing at one another about the proper role of government, or whether football players should kneel or not for the national anthem, she churns through overheated oceans, heaves up the land, and sends devastating winds to rip apart everything in her path. We are of no more concern to her than the fish in the sea, or the rocks of a mountain. So, from whence did all this human chutzpah come? And, when did kneeling become sacrilegious? I've always thought of it as a way of showing deference, of acknowledging the sacred. Perhaps I'm out of date.

We have lost our way. Or maybe not. Perhaps all this completely crazy hazing and posturing, flinging of insults and obscenities, our game-show focus on inconsequential things, will be like a wet slap to our collective faces. Maybe it will wake us up to what truly matters—this earth and all its living creatures, our sisters and brothers, our collective life. Could this be head-slap we need? I hope that today you put your focus on something that lifts your spirits, like this beautiful golden light on this autumn day.

                                                                 In the Spirit,

                                                                     Jane