In Love with Autumn
When I was in my spring,
I didn’t care for autumn much.
The aspen would turn gold
for a week, letting you know
It was time to buckle down
for another hard winter.
Now that I’m in it, I’m falling
in love with autumn.
I see differently in its weightless
light, in this clear air.
Today I bask in soft forgiveness
of an effortless sun.
Today I’m given thankful calm
to savor my life in peace, far-reaching peace,
a balance of light and dark
that has its own sense of humor.
Today I feast on harvests of ripe fruit
grown all summer long from blossoms
that fell away in spring.
There are seeds in the fruit I eat.
I don’t believe in life eternal.
I know it, like bees know,
who fill cells with honey
for sisters they’ll never meet.
One day all the figs and pomegranates
I have eaten will take root in my body.
Let winter come when it will.
I will sleep for a time, as things in winter do,
to rise in the sweetness of ripe figs
from jeweled wombs of pomegranates.
Lloyd A. Meeker
9/26/23
