When Spiders Rule
A chill wind blows the yellowing leaves off the trees. They drift down to the ground like giant snowflakes. The air is pregnant with the feel of the coming holidays. Fall has truly come with the sudden drop in temperatures. November appears as a mirror image of March. November is the vibrant color of decay while March is the decaying color of about-to-burst-forth Spring.
The birds are at the bird feeder all the time now. They are not stopped by our presence when we come to fill the feeder or blow leaves under it. Nothing stops them. They swoop around the feeder and the surrounding trees like Kamikaze pilots, darting here and there recklessly. The squirrels are in a frenzy as well, stock piling and burying acorns and walnuts which they will retrieve without fail in a month or so in a snow-covered land.
The trees are most beautiful for me at this time of year, when many of them are bare and a scattering of leaves remain on dark brown branches. The leaves that remain on the trees blow on the limbs with dainty grace in their precarious positions. Yet these are the survivors. The other leaves have fallen and gone the way all living things eventually go. Most trees have lost all their leaves and they stand in stark contrast against the blue sky, the stormy sky, even the night sky. They are perhaps most beautiful at night, like arms reaching up to the darkness trying to grab at the stars twinkling between the branches. Moonlight dances on their limbs.
November is the last glimmer of color and in some places the color seems to be predominantly yellow. A carpet of yellow lines the woods now. And now one can see inside the woods, so dark and impenetrable in summer. Some forests have carpets of oak leaves– dark brown tan in color. Or there are forest paths with variegated colors– vibrant crimsons against yellows and faded greens and tawny tans. The unmown lawns are now taken over by the spiders and, at moments, one can see a world of webs covering fields that only appear in a certain slant of sunlight. It is the silent take over of the spiders before the snows come.
The yellow, the brown, the crimson leaves are complemented by the ubiquitous yellow, brown and crimson mums that appear on the roadside near mail boxes, on porches or along driveways. These tough little flowers withstand frosty chills and stand tall throughout most of November. Hearty souls and so giving in their colorful, velvety splendor.
Soon the season of lights will begin. Autumn, as a season, seems the fastest to come and go. I hold each moment in my hands as a treasure, but the moments all sift through my fingers like grains of sand. Then Christmas comes and fades in a flash, and we are into the Nor’Easter blizzards of January. Another year is gone. The years do go faster as you grow older. We go about living our lives, trying, against our natures, to treasure the good moments. Now in November, at Thanksgiving, it is our time to say thank you. Inspired by the Native Americans let us thank the earth. Let us say thank you to the trees for their constantly changing beauty, to the stars for their piercing presence in the night sky, to the leaves for their beauteous colors, to the sun for its life-giving power, to the Spring for its awakening hope, to the Summer for its warm, thriving growth, to the Fall for its bounty, to the Winter for a time of renewal, to the snow flakes for their hushed, white silence that transforms our world, to the animals for their pure souls, to our families and friends for their love, and, lastly but mostly, to the Higher Power of our belief.
Happy Thanksgiving and may you each be blessed with the all embracing, pervasive Love in nature.
A Midsummer’s Night’s Dream
As twilight falls, as we approach August, the little sparks of light appear nightly… fireflies, lightening bugs, glow worms, whatever one chooses to call them. They start early in July– one sees a few sparks here and there but as July draws to a close, twilights dawn with a display of tiny fireworks. Why do they hold such fascination for young and old alike? Why do they bring us such a sense of wonder as they flicker on and off in some rhythm unknown to us but sparkling in communication with one another?
Of course I remember, like everyone else, catching fireflies. It was a ritual my Sicilian grandfather reenacted with me every summer. Grandma would save me a peanut butter jar, nicely washed with little holes in the top she made with an old-fashioned can opener. Grandpa and I would go out for an after-dinner walk, a treat in itself. It was a journey with a purpose, a hunt to catch those bugs whose tail ends light up, on and off, I learned later, to signal mates.
Grandpa always managed to catch one and we would walk home victorious, with me clutching my precious jar with my favorite kind of bug residing within. There was the exciting story we would tell Grandma and she would give me a lettuce leaf in case the bug should be hungry in the night. Then to bed. And then the real waiting began… lying in the dark with the jar on the bedside table waiting for my captive bug to alight. I would wait and wait but no flickering light appeared and before long I would fall asleep in the arms of disappointment.
It was even worse in the morning. The lightening bug did not look well. His antennae would be damp and sticking to the jar in a bad way. He was not eating the lettuce leaf. And this was my first lesson in the perils of capturing and imprisoning a creature. They did not behave like they did when free. Finally in a child’s form of despair, I would let him go and he would leave so much the worse for wear.
Years later, on my husband’s great aunt’s farm in Ohio, the trees would be filled with lightening bugs mating. It was a sight I had never seen. Whole trees would light up at once and upon close examination one would find hundreds of fireflies. It was a cathedral of flickering lights that brought awe as we beheld the mystery with our hearts.
And now, living in a converted barn which allows many bugs to enter despite window screens, the lightening bugs within are no longer in a jar but free to fly about our house. They bring sheer delight as they light up in the darkness of our bedroom. I am a child again with my beloved grandfather, though now I no longer want to capture the mystery as I stay awake as long as possible, watching the little flickering lights inside the room and outside in the trees. I think of simpler days and after dinner walks with Grandpa. I think a lot of my grandparents, but in the nostalgia, the magic of this tiny bug amazes still. And the magic brings joy as we share it with our children, our grandchildren, our beloved, anyone who can watch with us this Midsummer Night’s dream.
Inside Little Worlds
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“My Aunt Lilly”
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Divine Intelligence
“God is manifest in everything! Look at the beautiful earth, and how nature keeps it in balance– how there is a plan, an Intelligence behind everything in creation.”
Paramahansa Yogananda
A Flowering Friendship
“The duty of friends is to continuously help each other to develop themselves. When souls seek progress together in God, then divine friendship flowers.”
Paramahansa Yogananda
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Simplicity
“Live more simply, so that you can find time to enjoy the little pleasures of life.”
Paramahansa Yogananda
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Fly in a Lily, Millbrook, New York
The World Wide Web
The light is changing
I am dreaming of
an approaching Fall
but Mum is the word
I am dreaming of
the once spring green
of a Sugar Maple
turning shades of orange and yellow
Of the earlier sunsets
of mid-October
the time of un-mown lawns
the time of year
when spiders rule
out in the open
covering the fields
with the spiders’ secret
appearing only
in precious moments
a world of webs
that appear only
in a certain slant of sunlight
I have yet to capture
and they reveal a silent take-over
by the spiders
in webs that sparkle
secretly
silently
mirroring
the infinite web of creation.
The Inner World of Flowers
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Beetle and Fly in Goldenrod
Fly in Asian Lily
Fly in Asian Lily
Fly in Asian Lily
Ladybugs in Weeds
Bee in Joe Pye Weed
Snail and Ant on Leaf
Spider? in Dahlia
Katydid in Wilting Dahlia
Butterfly in Joe Pye Weed
My Ant Lily
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Welcome to samples of my work in various art forms showcasing “Eye-locks and Other Fearsome Things.” “Eye-locks” is a Bipolar/Asperger’s memoir in narrative form that describes the triumph of love over mental illness.
MOONSIDE 
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