fall

In memoriam…

/ Sherry Galey / 12 Comments

leaves-nov

In the visible world of nature, a great truth is concealed in plain sight. Diminishment and beauty, darkness and light, death and life are not opposites: they are held together in the paradox of the “hidden wholeness.”

In a paradox, opposites do not negate each; they cohabit and co-create in mysterious unity at the heart of reality. Deeper still, they need each other for health, just as our well-being depends on breathing in and out.

fall-filigree

When I try to fabricate a life that defies autumn’s diminishments, I end up in a state that’s less than human. When I give myself over to organic reality — to the endless interplay of darkness and light, falling and rising — the life I am given is as real and colorful, fruitful and whole as this graced and graceful world and the seasonal cycles that make it so.

Though I still grieve as beauty goes to ground, autumn reminds me to celebrate the primal power that is forever making all things new in me, in us, and in the natural world.

From Autumn: A Season of Paradox by Parker Palmer

 

In loving memory of Donald Gordon (1930 – 2016)

 

Rich spiced residues…

/ Sherry Galey / 15 Comments
dying cosmos1000
leavesalmonte1000
orange dahlia1000

Fall Song

Another year gone, leaving everywhere
its rich spiced residues: vines, leaves,

the uneaten fruits crumbling damply
in the shadows, unmattering back

from the particular island
of this summer, this NOW, that now is nowhere

except underfoot, moldering
in that black subterranean castle

of unobservable mysteries – roots and sealed seeds
and the wanderings of water. This

I try to remember when time’s measure
painfully chafes, for instance when autumn

flares out at the last, boisterous and like us longing
to stay – how everything lives, shifting

from one bright vision to another, forever
in these momentary pastures.

Mary Oliver
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I’ll be away from my blog for about a week. I look forward to catching up with you when I return. In the meantime, I hope you relish whatever particular delights this time of year offers in your part of the world!
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red leaf-1000b

Kim Klassen dot Com

The pyrotechnics of a new autumn…

/ Sherry Galey / 22 Comments

Everything was resplendent with the pyrotechnics of a new autumn.

Thomas Ligotti

leaf and bokeh

Bokeh leaf

ICM abstract

ICM abstract

Gold leaf
ICM energy
Looking up
Still reflections

Dreamlike walk in the woods

How many ways are there to capture autumn? Double exposures, ICM, reflections, macros, film, polaroids…I don’t know but as many as there are photographers, I guess.

What I am sure about is that for me the joy is in trying  to express my abiding love for this season through my images. And to interpret its many moods — its energy, its stillness, its melancholy, its whimsy. I’m crazy for all of it.

When I want to feast on the lovely and unique visions of others, I delight in the images of my sister photographers in the Focusing on Life Flickr pool.

I know I am in the company of kindred spirits when I soak up the beauty of their photographs and gasp at their oh-so-particular ways of seeing their world.

One of the FOL collective, Leigh Love, shares a glorious Ode to October in words and images that you won’t want to miss. While you’re there, why not enter their giveaway? It’s on until October 4.

If you’re an autumn enthusiast like me, do you have a favorite fall feeling or activity? Or do you just love it all?