You will tip with it. There is only one way to reconcile yourself with the northern calendar's peculiar balance of seasons. You must see fall as more than the shim wedged between solstices, separating days blurry with light and possibility from ever-lengthening nights that pile up in drifts, one after another. Otherwise, it becomes too easy to look behind at summer receding with all the things undone, or ahead toward the advancing smother of winter. I look around instead.
Deep reds seep into foliage knitted close to the ground, so that the hills smolder with quiet fury.
Black spruce shadow the valleys where a low, chill mist will rise tonight. The bony whiteness of the bare tors ahead is like a prophecy of snow. A part of me imagines turning south and walking as quickly as I can, marching far away from winter. But somehow winter always finds us, and today I cannot abandon the generosity of this view, the benevolent light pouring down. Like the unseen bears, I will groom crimson berries from among crimson leaves and consider it reason enough to linger.