Tinges of Autumn

Posted byKathleen Cassen MickelsonPosted inseasonalTags:, ,
Grasses in their autumn clothes.

In my last post, I wasn’t ready for summer to end. Today, as I walked on the trails near Snail Lake in Shoreview, Minnesota, there was clearly a tinge of autumn creeping across the landscape. Trees and grasses have taken on a yellowish hue, asters are in full bloom, geese gather together and lift off from lakes in a flurry of splashing water and honking. In our own garden, fall blooming flowers are alive with pollinators, while birds feast on seeds from spent flower heads.

Golden foliage and Canada geese on Snail Lake, Shoreview, Minnesota.
Morning sunlight through yellowing ferns.
A lone great blue heron hangs out in the wetlands near Snail Lake.
Fall-blooming mist flowers in our garden attract butterflies.
A trio of sparrows nestles in the wildflower garden behind our house.

And everything feels just right.

COMING UP ON ONE MINNESOTA CRONE

My Conversation with a Poet series will continue on October 1 with Puerto Rican poet Dorsía Smith Silva. I hope you’ll stop on by!

all photos by kcmickelson 2024

Published by Kathleen Cassen Mickelson

Kathleen Cassen Mickelson is a Minnesota-based writer who has published work in journals in the US, UK, and Canada. She is the author of the poetry chapbook How We Learned to Shut Our Own Mouths (Gyroscope Press, 2021) and co-author of the poetry collection Prayer Gardening (Kelsay Books, 2023).

5 thoughts on “Tinges of Autumn”

  1. It’s fall in Florida. Due to global warming, we had hurricane Milton rather late in the season. Halloween decorations were affected by the storm, and the palm trees stay green year-round, but there are some trees that look yellow, not from changing leaves but from fall flowers. I will be sunbathing by the pool in the heat of the day. I hope and pray you also enjoy sunshine that will come your way.—Deby Cedars

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  4. Leaves are falling from our cottonwoods. Clumps of yellow here and there up high, but it seems like when it all turns, it turns at once. Then I know fall is here. That and the geese honking their way over my house morning and night.

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    1. We were out in the garden today, clearing away some of the dead stuff so we can see the fall-blooming asters. The little bluestem is changing into this tapestry of hues that makes me want to slow down, make stew, linger a while.

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