AUTUMN IS IN THE AIR

Though October has bidden us farewell, autumn is yet far away from its prime and is slowly opening its gate to allow us to step on its threshold to welcome its blazing beauty. It is a season which is sandwiched between two harsh entities, sapping summer and unyielding winter, and that is why it enjoys a special place because of its mellowness and its wholesome weather. Frustrated by the sweltering heat, sticky and stifling climate of the long summers, autumn mercifully brings a respite with its breezy coolness and restores the mental and physical balance. Albert Camus paying a tribute to the beauty of autumn quips, “Autumn is a second spring where every leaf is a flower.”

This is a season which is nature lovers’ delight. The riot of colour enshrined in various aspects of the deciduous trees, remind you of the images which you’ve formed of Garden of Eden inhabited by Adam and Eve before their banishment from the heavenly abode.

The shedding of leaves in their magnificent glory of red, orange, yellow and deep maroon all around us, provide not only a breathtaking delight but elevates as well as overawes in terms of discipline it follows and munificence it grants, us mortals, who have almost forgotten about the blessedness of nature because it comes to us gratuitously. In John Keats “Ode to Autumn” there is a windfall of autumnal imagery, painting its exceptional gifts in words.


Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness!
Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;
Conspiring with him how to load and bless
With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run;

I recall the exotic presentation of nature’s extravaganza on both sides of the high way, when autumn was in its youthful splendour and we were driving from Philadelphia to New York a few years back. The scene is permanently carved in my memory for its picture perfect kaleidoscope of fantastic hues to draw inspiration there from.
Autumn symbolizes the continuity of the flow of life in its many avatars. At the moment, leave shedding is sparse, even when it catches on, lots of green will stay put for some time allowing two faces of the natural phenomenon to co-exist. The parts which make the whole will keep on overlapping its boundaries, manifesting nature’s mysteries which of course we’d never comprehend. As with nature, so it is true of life itself, wherein past, present and future have never an absolute break.

I’ll end with a beautiful quote from George Eliot: Delicious autumn! My soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird I would fly about the earth seeking the successive autumns.