Late autumn has come to the Pacific Northwest. Yesterday was the first day I felt a real chill in the air, and we've already had some snowfall at higher elevations. So far, it's mostly melting during the daytime, but you can see traces of snow in the photo below. (It's high on the peak above the prow of the barge). You can also see a little valley between peaks where low clouds were forming and then pouring out into the Gorge proper.
O world, I cannot hold thee close enough!
Thy winds, thy wide gray skies!
Thy mists, that roll and rise!
Thy woods, this autumn day, that ache and sag
And all but cry with color! That gaunt crag
To crush! To lift the lean of that black bluff!
World, world, I cannot get thee close enough!Long have I known a glory in it all
But never knew I this.
Here such a passion is
As stretcheth me apart. Lord, I do fear
Thou'st made the world too beautiful this year.
My soul is all but out of me - let fall
No burning leaf; prithee, let no bird call.-- "God's World", Edna St. Vincent Millay
Last week the maple, alder and birch trees were in full flame, gold and red, forming a dramatic contrast against the fixed green of the Douglas firs and cedars. Now every gust of wind brings the leaves drifting down; sometimes just one or two, sometimes in flurries. Soon the trees and bushes will be bare skeletons again, stark against the gray sky and wet pavement of winter.
Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.-- "Nothing Gold Can Stay", Robert Frost
Comments