‘Equal Night is tonight’

     

Elm Forest in Autumn by Edvard Munch, oil on canvas, 1919-20.

Here in the Northern Hemisphere, the autumnal equinox will arrive tonight at 9:54 (New York time), when our sun will cross the celestial equator, resulting in an equal amount of sunlight reaching both the Northern and Southern hemispheres, and day and night shall be equal (give or take) all around the globe. Equinox means “equal night.”

For us, it spells the beginning of fall.

Nothing Gold Can Stay

Robert Frost

Nature’s first green is gold,

Her hardest hue to hold.

Her early leaf’s a flower;

But only so an hour.

Then leaf subsides to leaf.

So Eden sank to grief,

So dawn goes down to day.

Nothing gold can stay.

It is time for harvest and feasts; for darker days and longer sleep; to retire sweet Virginias for English and Balkan; and for wearing wool, tweed, leather, and denim. We’re halfway to the solstice.