25 September 2012
God's World
O world, I cannot hold thee close enough!
Thy winds, thy wide grey
skies!
Thy mists, that roll and rise!
Thy woods, this autumn day, that
ache and sag
And all but cry with colour! That gaunt crag
To crush! To
lift the lean of that black bluff!
World, World, I cannot get thee close
enough!
Long have I known a glory in it all,
But never knew I
this;
Here such a passion is
As stretcheth me apart, -- Lord, I
do fear
Thou'st made the world too beautiful this year;
My soul is all but
out of me, -- let fall
No burning leaf; prithee, let no bird call.
Edna St. Vincent Millay
When I was young (this will surprise my grandchildren who have never known a young me!) I fell in love with autumn. I think it first began when I started school--fall brought the exciting adventure of entering a whole new, unknown world. The big yellow bus lumbered me from my very sheltered farm life into town to an entirely new place, to many new faces, to sudden confrontation with a different life. I soon loved being a student; I discovered I could do what the teacher required; I enjoyed learning to read and write and the satisfaction of achievement.
So Autumn became associated with good stuff. And it was beautiful. After a long hot Texas summer, it was invigorating to experience the changes that came in September in temperature and color and that essential ambiance that defies description.
When I was 14 and falling in love with other things, I came across this poem that called my name and it has been a favorite ever since. This morning when I took the photo from my deck, it came to mind again. The beginning of Autumn happens so subtly and yet so suddenly that it always lifts my soul: that slight degree of different slant of sunlight, that hint of crispness in the early morning air, that certain silent knowing of coming change. It always happens in August while it is still hot summer; a harbinger that turns our hearts forward to this favorite season that gives me personal permission to re-engage in good changes, myself.
* * * * * * * * *
In September 1970 I went to visit my sister Sharon in Colorado Springs for a couple of days for a rare and much-needed break. Upon returning, everything was different-- Poem #72 Sept 1970
Beginning of New Things
I went away once for three dear days~
I looked down and studied the same brown
ground
in kind of a new light and I wondered
"Has this hole changed?" I even got around
to wondering if my feet were swollen
from all that traipsing about on other roads,
but when I measured, the dimensions were the same.
Then mostly by chance ~
it certainly wasn't by habit~
I looked up and up and stood still smiling,
quite startled by the shimmering sky,
by bright bunches of gold in the trees,
and most of all by the dance of my mind
that suddenly, strongly, defied old decrees.
in kind of a new light and I wondered
"Has this hole changed?" I even got around
to wondering if my feet were swollen
from all that traipsing about on other roads,
but when I measured, the dimensions were the same.
I looked up and up and stood still smiling,
quite startled by the shimmering sky,
by bright bunches of gold in the trees,
and most of all by the dance of my mind
that suddenly, strongly, defied old decrees.
* * * * * * * * *
* * * * * * * * *
OK, going back even further, to my 59th poem written Nov 1965 in Rocky Ford, Colorado:
November 16th
The slanting sun this autumn afternoon
in orange-red warmth so strangely weakly rayed
(how has it happened that it moved this soon,
when yesterday it had not thusly strayed?)
This curious sun, today more distant orbed,
is sending now a message shining sung;
but here whirl I upon clod earth, disturbed,
just missing those rich notes I know are flung.
Who moved away? the sun? the earth? or me?
If only I could comprehend this sun,
I should be pulsed with strength, set free,
and with impunity could stop or run.
To only half-perceive is bitterness;
to be half-free, half-full, is emptiness.
* * * * * * * * *
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