With Halloween, All Saints and All Souls Day/Dia de los Muertos, falling across a weekend this year, it was easy to see how they function as a Tridium: a set of three days, as if to balance the Holy Thursday-Good Friday-Easter Tridium of Spring.

Living in Pennsylvania many years ago I tried to write a poem worthy of the bright fall colors, ending it

colors of the sun
set, and November puts the world to sleep.

In the temperate climate where I live now, nature seems not to sleep, but our spirits still need to crawl into the dark for a bit, all those winter light festivals notwithstanding. Here, I hope for November to provide good rain to ready the earth for spring growth.

A small poem celebrating nature’s wisdom:

Cycles

Fallen trees make room
for new growth, efficient plants
doing nature’s will
without need of commandments
faithful as Jonah’s gourd vine.

Paper made from trees
pages assembled in books:
how can they be turned
to mulch to regain their place
in nature’s pattern?