To Autumn < The Happy Monk Baking Company

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;

— John Keats, "To Autumn"

Autumn, with its mists and shimmering colours, has seemed incredibly vivid on Pender this year. The startling pink morning skies, the slanting orange light of the evenings, reflecting off the peeling trunks of arbutus trees.

The Maple, Sycamore, and Alder leaves have been glorious against the forest greens and the clear blue skies. The brown and yellow leaves at the roadsides fly up and scatter as cars speed by, then skitter behind in the draft of hissing tires and exhaust fumes.

Last weekend the southeast winds came booming across the Pass and pressed hard against the rocky cliffs of South Pender. The grey, white-capped waves tussled and frothed and surged toward us as we stood on the edge behind the gorse bushes. They blew some cobwebs away, that’s for sure, and told us in no uncertain terms that the gentle, sun-dappled days of summer were done for now.

Bare ruined choirs

The Garry Oaks lost most of their leaves in that gale, though a few survivors shivered awhile the next day, hanging from black branches, like Shakespeare’s “bare-ruined choirs where late the sweet birds sang.”

The air is colder now in the morning. The house waits for warmth from the fire to take the chill off the room. And we pull on sweaters and socks to pad about the kitchen while the coffee drips. A few sailboats round Turn Point in a late-season regatta, staying close to shore to give a wide berth to the behemoth freighters. They rumble past our cliffs, Winter, or Spring in the light of day or darkness of night.

The blue moon came, too, though it was hardly blue but undoubtedly large and startling bright! It’s so called because it’s the second full moon of the month and sometimes appears blue because of a rare form of chemical radiation.

Elvis in a Fall morning

And at three in the morning, I found the old Elvis song, “Blue Moon of Kentucky,” echoing in the back of my mind as I waited for Mildrith to cool.

Where are the songs of Spring? Aye, where are they?
Think not of them, — thou hast thy music too,
While barrèd clouds bloom the soft-dying day,
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;

— John Keats, "To Autumn"

The raven calls have softened to muted croaks. Out in the Pass, seagulls pitch and dive over a bloom of anchovy. Today, a Cooper’s Hawk hit the glass door to our kitchen. It landed on the patio, where it gathered its wits a moment, then flew off. The turkey vultures have long left town.

Autumn on the west coast of Canada is rougher than the “mellow fruitfulness” of John Keats’ English countryside. But it evokes the same wistfulness that comes from the slow retreat indoors, and the harsh weather asserts itself. It’s not far away, those gloomy days and weeks of rain and wind.

Let me have just a few more days …

It seems too early for snow, yet Vancouver had its first big dump earlier today. And as I looked at the news reports, I was glad not to be in the city, driving those filthy, slick streets.

There is still Autumn to savour on Pender — a few more days, at least — and then I will be ready.

               … and now with treble soft
The red-breast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

— John Keats, "To Autumn"

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Bare ruined choirs

Elvis in a Fall morning

Let me have just a few more days …

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