Came back from a walk this morning feeling inspired :) today's prompt is saving!
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I have often heard it said that fall is like the evening.
Perhaps that is still true of autumn in Japan - but if so, then it is not an evening of fading, of tired returning, nor withering. Not quite even of melancholy. Rather - a quiet, deliberate unleashing of true colors. As if after a day of difficult but fruitful toil, the evening will come flushed in an excellent, royal and dignified merriment.
There is an air of settledness, certainly. But also of saving - the spilling forth of the hitherto hidden - the startling, syrupy red that nature has been saving through the bustle of noon. Come evening, it now stains the cover of endless leaves like the brightening, flaming embroidery of the finest of evening dresses.
Autumn here is entrancing. It is the radiant but relaxed goddess come out to languish, as she sleepily watches the cooling of the world, and - mirroring the fire of her gown - the sunset of the year.