I wandered through the forest

Gathering fall-colored leaves.

Shannon, my granddaughter, needed them for show-and-tell.

She lives in Florida and leaves don’t turn

Russet and gold and orange and red down there.

But up in Carolina (what Shannon calls my home) those colors abound.

So my daughter and I gathered the leaves.

When I sent the box,

It was like mailing air.

Those leaves adorned bulletin boards –

North Carolina leaves for Florida children.

–Jenny Munro

Autumn is a melancholy season

Or so the poets say.

I don’t agree.

It’s not a sad and somber time.

Fall is a gush of vivid color – red, yellow, orange and gold

Along with the differing hues of the evergreens that make their home

In my mountains – the pine, spruce, hemlock and rhododendron.

No, autumn isn’t the season of dying and death.

It’s a time when the trees and earth sink into sleep, their long winter’s nap.

That sleep strengthens the world; the seasons change and the earth awakes.

Rebirth surges with the vibrant new life, the fresh tenderness, of spring.

Autumn isn’t melancholy; it’s part of the dance of life.

– Jenny Munro