The miracle of a buttercup on October 30th

“Tis the season when the leaves blow madly out of the trees.

The wind sings and the leaves fall.

The earth gleams lush with a yellow carpet of golden leaves, interspersed with bright red of maple, lavish green of birch, dusky- orange of oak.

The skeletons of trees remain, silhouetted against an autumn sky.

Grey skies and skeletons on the horizon

So you look up in the late October sky.  Watch out!  Duck!  There’s a leaf flying in your eye!  Swat it away and look up again.  Look at the skeletons of tree limbs on the horizon.  We are now at the time of year when the trees become bones.  No wonder we celebrate Halloween.  The world is filled with bones of trees everywhere…empty of colorful leaves…skeletons against the sky.

Wild basil in the ditch

It is indeed a miracle to discover a flower blooming at this time of year.  Everything looks so sparse.  So empty.  And then, in the oddest places, blooms a flower!  How could this happen?  It is as if the Universe kindly and gently speaks to us, saying very quietly, “You will find my miracles even in the darkest days of your life.  There I will bloom.”

Sky and branches

A Native American friend once said, “Even in the deep of winter you can dig beneath the snow and find green medicinal plants.”  Even when we think the world is stark and empty and void, plants grow beneath the surface, beneath the obvious, available for those with faith.

The gift of goldenrod

I always gasp a little, glimpsing the unexpected flowers.  To imagine that they exist even after the hard edges of frost browned most of the landscape.  These flower-children have been hiding in ditches and protected areas.  They offer the world new hope in these days of freezing.

Double-pronged in the sky

The wind blows and the rain spits and it’s 62 degrees at mid-afternoon.  Barry and I sit on the deck before dinner, perhaps the last time this season.  I sweep leaves off the deck, unto the lawn below.  Later I rake up some of the leaves (although he will mow the majority of them with his lawn tractor).

The wind keeps blowing fiercely, sending dozens of leaves to their winter resting-place.  It’s almost impossible to photograph their final plummet.  You snap picture after picture, but only photograph dots in the sky.  The wind also shudders the leaves on the grounds, making their autumn whispering sounds as they blow around in circles in the driveway.

But wait!  One lone leaf drifts downward.  Can we capture it? 

Another miracle, indeed.

Leaf, cloud, blue sky

Make a wish.  Open your hand. If you catch the leaf, your wish will come true.