THE BALM OF LIFE, SPRINGS IN BASIN PARK paintography and photography and poetry by Michael (Miguel) Forbus NUDE TREES by MIGUEL This week it has begun to feel like winter and fall has fought it’s valiant fight and lost. It showed us it’s finery, its delightful late blooming flowers that are cold tolerant and the magnificent finery of it’s leafs, it’s lovely dress. And now the mountain stands shivering, nude, like a woman who has somehow misplaced her clothing and her limbs, thin and withered are the branches of the trees. The trees know that winter approaches and the delightful colors of the valleys and ranges out my window suddenly are gray and barren, as a dying love would seem. I have seen trees laden with the most lovely yellows, as sun rays in the deep blue sky, and reds that are apples and blood colored leafs, and they gave me great joy. The lavender mums, have now rusted and gone to bed and the gardens are all in a state of disarray as the clothing of the old woman who stands in the hills and tells me that fall is here, nude with withered limbs. I love nature in all it’s glory, all it’s natural rhythm. But I cannot love fall. It tells me that I will have no warm sun on my chest, no day that I may go without remembering all the clothing I must wear and I cannot tolerate. The voice of fall tells me that the snow will come and I will have to be less carefree and less able to more about. She is a once beautiful lady, this mountain, one that has gotten old and has no shine for me now. No color that makes my eyes tear. They tear now for loss of beauty and loss of the sprouting of fresh flowers and lovely tomatos and herbs from the garden and walks with a loved one in the warmth and naked swims in the moonlight. She stands nude, embarrassed, her limbs shriveled and gray as the limbs of the trees out the window of my cabin, the window I stared out of for hours counting the shades of green and spotting love birds singing for joy. For warmth. Now the animals scurry around gathering repast for the winter months and they know things will be tough and they will become hunted. It is no longer a carefree life. So I must tell you all that in a little more then a week, I will be on the beach again, my clothes useless to me, my morning walk in the sun with the waves crashing, my dearest friend again. I will become a child of the sea, a fish, a wave rider. And leave this nude woman of a mountain and her shivering, naked and embarressed. Written by Miguel as he becomes cold heading for the Gulf.