In the autumnal garden

The garden has been slowly losing its freshness day by day, and here and there some ashen leaves would come swirling down from time to time… then more.  And more…  

 ...over there a yellowish-orange leaf.  Toasted leaves.  Reddish-brown leaves.  One.  Two.  Three.  Four leaves.  A dance in mid-air.  Maples, sycamores, yellow-poplars, Sweetgums.  Leaves that resemble some sorts of magical, sad faces that have already seen too much of the seasons...

It is definitely autumn, or the beginning of autumn around here. 

One would expect to find a sad garden in the fall.  And in a way, you would.  Every little petal, every leaf in the Crepe Myrtles, every spreading lobe and long, seductively spiked trusses of the Butterfly bushes... all are dying away.  The garden is quietly laying down its life as magically as it came to be, when it blossomed.   With it, too, fades away the spirit of the woman who lives in this garden. 

I can feel it's longings; how it breathes its last breath.  I see it weeping as it offers a final farewell to all it loves here.  To the garden, and its surroundings.  Quietly accepting this 'parting', in a most desperate way at the same time.  

  

It is hard to say goodbye to the wild things of Nature.  To your magical little world.  To those roses you planted one day, hoping to see them bloom on another.  Hard to say goodbye to your sacred space, to the woods under the fairy-tale light of the end of day.  To the cardinals serenading your early mornings, and the flirting games of hummingbirds across your windows, while having breakfast by the big, square table by the man you love. 

  And how can this old soul part away from all those things, 

and still forget them? 

I stand, shadowless, like silence, listening to the autumnal voices of my garden.  I hear it weeping, just like my soul is weeping.  And as I collect all of my belongings—dear little garden things, angels and fairies and trellises, my eyes are also searching the brown heart of the woods across the garden.  Searching among the bramble that forms the underground, and the perennial rootstock that throws up new shoots in the spring.  Remembering.  Drinking all in with the eyes of the soul, as to never forget.  

And how can I look for the slender privet shrubs that populate my woods, and not think of their  lovely May flowers?  The white blossoms just about covering every shrub, and the nice sweet smell. A scent that smells just like a spring day… and that’s about all I can say to describe the lovely scent of the privet flower.  Yes, I am taking all of this with me, and perhaps part of my spirit will always remain here?

A lot of interesting little things has been happening around here these past days, but I can only talk about it when I'm far away... when I’m finally tucked away in my garden in the roses.  But that, too, that’s another story of its own, and it must be told when my feet finally get grounded in rose soil, and the sun of another season shrouds my spirit with peace and contentment again.

We’ve been saying goodbye to a lot of good people as well.  Many, many lovely friends we have made here, and learn to love.  Going out with them to brunches, and dinners and farewell parties and prayers and good wishes.  My little heart feels sad, and happy and uncertain.  It wavers at times, and it is filled with bittersweet songs all the time.

I am almost done packing.  All is left now is part of the kitchen, and then some more.  Boxes have been storage in the garage, and I have continued giving away a lot of my treasures, gifting away everything my heart tells me to… to my kids who live here in the South, to friends, neighbors, taking things to donation centers and such.  In return, I’ve bought a couple of new outfits suitable for those chilly days of the autumns of the north, and if I find a pair of boots I like, I will get them too, to replace those few ones I'd given away.

The October wind is bringing inside the little white cottage the scent of the dying garden, the cooler evenings fanning in the ashes of what’s about to perish.  I’m done here.  What I love, is always near at hand, always in earth, and air.