Ah, Fall...

“Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower.” ― Albert Camus

Every year at this time, the Sedum Autumn Joy turns this glorious rust color you see above. 

It starts changing in the last weeks of August. As the days and weeks pass, the color predictably deepens.

Farther down the patio fence, you see some plants, like the chartreuse sweet potato vine, at the very peak of lush. 

The peppermint next to it is full of scent and growing wildly in every nook and cranny. The plants and flowers have reached out to one another until they blended. It is hard to see where one ends and the other begins.

This is the time of summer's last stand. 

Fall has arrived. On the calendar at least. Not in the temperature. 

Not yet.

The Black-eyed Susan is all eye and no flowers. What's left of the golden flower petals have dried up and turned under.

The purple-leafed sweet potato vine curls around the driftwood, clinging to the end of summer. 

The patio garden is going through the motions as it always does year after year. The vines trail and curl and reach toward the sun. 

Very soon the plants will, together as one, wave goodbye and sleep until spring.

“It looked like the world was covered in a cobbler crust of brown sugar and cinnamon.” ― Sarah Addison Allen, First Frost