The Breezes Taste of Apple Peel …

 "September: it was the most beautiful of words, he’d always felt, evoking orange-flowers, swallows, and regret."
-   Alexander Theroux, 1981

The autumn equinox will soon be upon us – September has flicked her skirts and laughed in the face of dreary August.  She has showered us with sunshine, and one last lingering look at summer.  For that I am grateful.

"Try to remember the kind of September
When life was slow and oh so mellow
Try to remember the kind of September
When grass was green and grain so yellow
Try to remember the kind of September
When you were a young and a callow fellow
Try to remember and if you remember
Then follow--follow, oh-oh." 
-  Try to Remember, Lyrics by Tom Jones and Harvey Schmidt

The garden has been filled with bees and butterflies and all flying things  settling to collect pollen whilst there is time.  Soon the flowers will wither and seed heads will form ready to scatter themselves over the newly dug earth and continue to delight and surprise next year when the earth warms and spring bulbs emerge.

"Smoke hangs like haze over harvested fields,
The gold of stubble, the brown of turned earth
And you walk under the red light of fall
The scent of fallen apples, the dust of threshed grain
The sharp, gentle chill of fall.
Here as we move into the shadows of autumn
The night that brings the morning of spring
Come to us, Lord of Harvest
Teach us to be thankful for the gifts you bring us ..."
-  Autumn Equinox Ritual

The fruit harvest has been good – freezers and jars and trays have been filled with the bounty.  Farmers in their trusty tractors have been trundling up and down the fields bringing in hay and grain - and foragers have been out and about with bags and baskets collecting berries, apples, sloes and damsons from the hedgerows – soon the mushrooms will show their faces as the season gets cooler and the mists   lay across the fields in a ghostly manner.

"The breezes taste
Of apple peel.
The air is full
Of smells to feel-
Ripe fruit, old footballs,
Burning brush,
New books, erasers,
Chalk, and such.
The bee, his hive,
Well-honeyed hum,
And Mother cuts
Chrysanthemums.
Like plates washed clean
With suds, the days
Are polished with
A morning haze."
-   John Updike, September

The year is slowly  passing with one last hurrah for summer and the race is on to complete all those gardening jobs that have amassed – saying goodbye to all those annual flowers that have done a sterling job in blooming all summer – emptying the container plantings and replacing with spring bulbs – gardening seems to be about keeping one step ahead  - so much to be done, so little time to do it in.  Change is coming – maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow – but soon.

"the air is different today
the wind sings with a new tone
sighing of changes
coming
the harvest gathered
a flower, a nut
some mead, and bread
a candle and a prayer
returning the fruits
in thanksgiving
to the grove
and receiving
it's blessing
again"
-   Rhawk, Alban Elfed

The nights are chill and fires have been lit, log piles replenished and kindling collected.  The kitchen is filled with the scent of sauces bubbling on the stove – windfall apples, bruised and battered, and cherry tomatoes for pasta.

It is gloomy this morning – grey and misty – I sit by the open window and hear a robin in the tree outside – in the distance I can hear the sound of the hunt master blowing his horn and the pack of dogs barking and yipping as they collect to swarm across the fields excited to begin the chase.  A sure sign that autumn is upon us.