Fall, Autumn

I don't know how I know it's autumn in England, but I do. At noon time, on a Tuesday afternoon in my garden as I eat my lunch outside. I am here because it is sunny, not too chilly, and I know that it is autumn. There is the light, a certain mixture of smells, a calm.

This is new to me, never experiencing autumn here before, but I imagine it is the same sensory inputs that let me know it's fall in California. It is usually at dusk one early evening when I have happened to set out for walk and there is always wood smoke in the air. The smell of it permeates drifts above the streets and the light is lower through the trees. Their colors are changing too, but they alone are not the indication.

In my first literature class in college, I read a poem about an evening football game at a Texas high school, the fervor of the action, the setting of the scene. There were those in my section who had no idea what the poem was talking about. I said, to me, this poem is fall back home. The full moon rising orange over the eastern mountains, visible from the high school bleachers painted red and gold. The players and cheerleaders on the field below, the spectators bundled, chatting, distracted, the high school band playing.