September is transition. Summer lingers, but autumn is clearly on the horizon. Days are shorter, evenings cooler. But even with that melancholy, there is the certainty that this is exactly how things are meant to be. September is a reminder that change can be beautiful.
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September is the month of maturity;
the heaped basket and the garnered sheaf.
It is the month of climax and completion.
– Patience Strong (1951). “The Glory of the Garden”
“ … there is a clarity about September. On clear days, the sun seems brighter, the sky more blue, the white clouds take on marvelous shapes; the moon is a wonderful apparition, rising gold, cooling to silver; and the stars are so big. … and there’s a promise that what September starts, October will carry on, catching the torch flung into her hand.”
Faith Baldwin, Evening Star
September … begins with August’s leftovers
and it ends with October’s preparations …
Hal Borland
September strews the woodland o’er
With many a brilliant color;
The world is brighter than before,
Why should our hearts be duller?
Sorrow and the scarlet leaf,
Sad thoughts and sunny weather,
Ah me! this glory and this grief
Agree not well together…
~Thomas William Parsons, “A Song for September”
“Here as we move into the shadows of autumn
The night that brings the morning of spring
Come to us, Lord of Harvest
Teach us to be thankful for the gifts you bring us …”
– Autumn Equinox Ritual
“Let’s strive to be better in September!” Charmaine J. Forde