Reflection: Light

Today is a day filled with the yellow gold halo of autumn. Sunlight filters through every tree of crimson and yellow, even gilding the deep greens fading to bronzed brown. The light of this season is one of the reasons I detour to run under the mile long canopy of grand old maples that line both sides of Manito Boulevard; why, like the old dog used to, I take a pause at the glass doors, soaking in the warm brightness of the morning sun, coffee cup in hand. Not thinking, particularly. Content to soak up the light without thought or agenda, just being. Autumn is to me the great Season of Contentment. To be, to appreciate, to dwell in these moments of living that are resplendent with the plentitude of all that grows and ripens and gives.

One of the most beloved poems, ever, is Mary Oliver's The Ponds. I'd like to share with you the last three stanzas to bless this day ~

Still, what I want in my life
is to be willing
to be dazzled -
to cast aside the weight of facts

and maybe even
to float a little
above this difficult world.
I want to believe I am looking

into the white fire of a great mystery.
I want to believe that the imperfections are nothing -
that the light is everything - that it is more than the sum
of each flawed blossom rising and fading. And I do.