WINTER'S GHOST:
Autumn moon
incautious in the dark river
Winter’s ghost walks
with a covered face
and silver bones wait in all animals
to be bone cloth upon her shoulder
wait for her happiness in that they are silver

Autumn is here and winter is coming.
Two guests I could do without.
I am afraid of them, these strangers
living outside my greenhouse.
They press against the glass, voyeurs,
these seasonal saboteurs.

In art and mythology, the Goddess appears in three forms. White represents the virgin, red the mother, and black, the crone, or the death-goddess.

Dreams are like the old stories where wolves are seekers always running, and women carry fire in their bare hands and light the dark paths before them.
Old stories hold that the birds will fly all the miles of the world to tell your secrets to the rising moon, and men will walk over oceans of ice to find one truth.

Spring passes and one remembers one's innocence.
Summer passes and one remembers one's exuberance.
Autumn passes and one remembers one's reverence.
Winter passes and one remembers one's perseverance.

There is something incredibly nostalgic and significant about the annual cascade of autumn leaves.