On the first day of September there was a soft luminosity to the hills and valleys. Sunlight was filtered by a faint haze, its strength thrusting warmth and brightness upon a land just beginning to think of beckoning slumber. Crops have been harvested, fields ploughed and harrowed. The smooth naked curves of the soil are settling, relaxing and awaiting a long rest. Now their sensuousness entrances, but soon they will cool into hibernation, frigid and scarcely breathing.
For now the land is like a healthy body undressed and stretched out. The hills are like limbs, the ridges muscle. Leaves fall about to be blown by the breeze, like full hair over well formed shoulders. The organism that provides our food rests, another year's task complete. But still her beauty is laid out for enjoyment. She is my companion wandering the trails.
I will grant her a contented dreamy autumn even as I seek to lie down with her one more time on a sunny hillside to enjoy the last warm rays of an angled golden sun. She will thrill me with the final vivid beech leaves, then grant me a gift of windfall apples. I'll accept her winter's slumber as I miss the lively beauty of summer, for she is no corpse in a box receiving final respects. But I shall miss my good friend.
I imagine a dry trail where every footfall raises a puff of dust. I look for the landmark that is my objective: a hill or a pass, a wood perhaps with an inviting meadow in its lee. I think of the end of a hot afternoon, my horse grazing, me supine in a shady spot having cooled my feet in a clear stream - with my friend.
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