Sharp staccato shapes,
Shaded, curled and furled,
Rustling in the wind,
Shadowed and dried,
Veins reduced to lines,
Patterned and patinated,
Crisp and soft,
Tired but ancient,
Light as life has left you…
Remaining skeleton of tree.
Tag: Autumn
Leaving leaves
Leaves you have fallen,
Clawed the sky then slumped to the ground.
Wet, damp, cold, you shiver on pavements,
You crush together on grass,
Just a carpet of colour flavouring the world.
Only here in temperate lands, leaves fall each year.
North the evergreens take over, south the rainforest.
Here we abide in heat and cold. Sun and rain,
Leaves leave, love fades, life continues.
Bringing the houseplants in
Our houseplants have always sat on the kitchen window sill but they had to be unceremoniously chucked out while we had the kitchen and bathroom replaced. Some of the plants had been here since we moved in about 24 years ago. They were old, battered, pot bound, but they had survived. Anyway the upshot was they all sat outside in the hot summer sun and got watered when the other plants outside were fed and watered. They were all close to the house with lots of plants surrounding them so they were sheltered.
It’s getting cold finally this autumn The forecast is for cold weather and winds from tomorrow. The other garden plants are fading so it was time to get them back in.
What we found were plants that had outgrown their pots, or ones where part of the plant had crisped and died, but the other side was covered in new growth. So they are all back inside now. Tucked into new pots, with found objects as trays underneath to stop water leaking onto the window ledge. I’ve used a couple of old teacups for the Christmas cactuses that Richard bought a few weeks ago. They are already in flower.
So we have a kitchen, bathroom and bedroom full of plants ….. They might go outside again next year.
Progress!
She’s almost done. I’m just trying to get a bit more of a 3d effect. I’m liking the more sombre colours but I’m putting a glimmer of gold into this. The face is quite controlled, I’m trying to go for a medieval look. Hope you like it (and the person who has commissioned it)
Reddish
Red leaves sprawl on the ground. Reddish brown flights of fancy.
Reddish butterflies spin and whirl. Red and yellow stir the air.
Rubera and Ochre and verdant green. Colours of Autumn shape the world. Russet fingers fling outwards.
Brown’s burn to red, fire and gold. Blackened and rotting as cold and rain dampen their crisp outlines.
Give back to the soil, returning to earth. Wilderness and suburbs mashed together, following the floating leaves down stream to the sea.
Life renews, water falls, tree branches lie dormant until warmth returns to rebuild their leaves from the air we breathe.
Acers
I took lots of photos of these trees at a garden centre in Wales. Small and perfectly formed, their colours seem to glow against the dull grey sky. A shaft of sunlight makes the colours explode. Glorious and wonderful.
A lot of the leaves are palmate, meaning hand shaped. The leaves are strongly divided into thinner and thinner strips of crimson red or deep yellow at this time of year. We have an acer in our garden but it always seems to have a white sheen to it. I think it is in the wrong place next to a bigger tree which is robbing it of moisture. I sometimes water it to try and help. It changes to a very dark deep red in autumn and its leaves are less indented, more maple like. With the sun shining through them this morning they look bronze or copper coloured.
Trying haiku
I just thought I would try…syllables 5-7-5….
Glowing embers shine
Flying leaves heat the cold sky anew
Autumn falls golden
Autumn view
Autumn is flying in on strong winds.
I tried to paint its rapid journey. You could almost see the colours changing in front of you as the trees blew in a warm wind from the south.
I ended up with quite a pointellist painting. Lots of tiny dots of colour. Difficult to get the shapes of the branches and limbs right.
Leaf fall
Crash.! Copper leaves rattle to the ground,
Metallic green willow leaves whirl around,
Dizzy spinning red acers, palm shaped, flutter into drifts.
Glowing gold Oak petals shimmer by the canal.
Hidden deep in a pile of leaves a cat waits to pounce on a wood mouse.
Flying like snow the fiery beech leaves burn into the blue sky.
Evergreens wave in envy, wishing they could change colour too.
Waiting for winter the trees stand proud, their autumn uniforms shimmer and billow.
Soon the gaudy clothes will be gone, and nude and chilly the trees will await a soft green spring.
X
Autumn
Or Fall as it is also called.
About this time of year in the Northern hemisphere (and six months before or after in the Southern hemisphere) experience a change in season from Summer to Autumn. The nights start to last longer than the days, and the further north you go the shorter the days get.
The heat from the Sun cannot warm the North as much, so as the heat of the day dissipates into the atmosphere as the sun sets the temperature starts to drop.
In towns where buildings hold on to heat the temperature at night can be a few degrees warmer than in the countryside.
Now comes the season of “mists and mellow fruitfulness” and when there is a high pressure system over the land and the winds and breezes drop. Then on cold mornings a mist or fog can be caused by moist air close to the ground. Sometimes the mist is accompanied by frosts and leaves falling from the trees can glisten with ice crystals as the sun breaks through the clouds.
Each day and night the chlorophyll is sucked from leaves back into the main body of the plants leaving yellow and red pigments behind such as xanthophyll.
These days, with global warming, the leaves stay on the trees for weeks longer. In my childhood they would all have fallen by 5th November when we have bonfire night here in Britain, now they can still be on the trees by the end of that month.
One problem this causes is that we get storms from the Atlantic which rush across the country. They can buffet the trees and the leaves act like sails.
We have had violent winds that tear limbs from trees and even blow them over. There gave been a series of storms which have done damage over the last few years. There is also a strong link between plant diseases and warming of the atmosphere. As the temperature rises sickness such as Sudden Oak death and Ash die back are moving up the country.
A report today by scientists stated that the world is set to overshoot its 1.5°Celsius target of global warming and may exceed 2°C or even 3°C.
The changing seasons could have a devastating effect on the world. We may enjoy the beauty of fall but we should guard that world for our children and their children’s children.
