Cold Choices

 

October. Already?

Seems like yesterday I emerged intact from a long, hard winter hibernation, opened the back door, and inhaled the beautiful fragrance of spring lilacs. Not today.

Today the leaves are falling, the pumpkins are ripe, and the apples are crisp. Folks in Minnesota are closing up the cabins, finding the down comforters, and buying the firewood. Instead of lilacs we smell bonfires.

Winter is just around the corner.

Fall is my favorite season. Not because winter is coming. I don’t like the thought of ice and snow and the deep freeze of it all. I like it because for one golden moment Time seems to stand still. It seems to say—

Sit with me one glorious hour and as you sit, think.

Drink in the dazzling beauties of the falling leaves and as you reflect on the glory and grandeur of the majesty of this radiance, as you drink it in, let it remind you to ponder what’s just ahead, around the corner.

Get ready. It’s a cue.

Put away the summer clothes. Get out the snow blower. Patch the cracks in the window frames.

Winter is coming.

Am I ready?

———————–

COLD CHOICES

when all October stands

hush, morning

every tree beguiles

the leaf imprint

slow dawns

orange, pink, blue

crimson mercy of my soul

yes

Sunshine floods

make the Day dawn less brief than it would be if you had taken that road

toward the east or south

the road not taken

so you can see

the pink, blue red grace and stay with it

sit with it

watch it bless

while it sets its feet

in the soul of your saved mind

and makes it

forever

fall

toward Narnia

*****************

© Barbara LaTondresse – 18 October 1999 – all rights reserved