in appreciation of autumn leaves

This weekend's wind and rain brought the last of the glorious firey leaves to the ground.

As we've been walking through the neighborhood these last few weeks, I keep pondering to myself what words I can use to describe the trees at this time of year.

A phrase from a Wallace Stevens poem came to mind the other day.
We had the poem read at our wedding--"The Final Soliloquy of the Interior Paramour."  "...a warmth,

a light...

 a power,

the miraculous influence..."

That seemed to capture perfectly what I feel as I walk under the sheltering canopy of these luminous trees,

on the brightly colored carpet of their leaves. 

"But outside my window all day a maple has stepped from her
          leaves like a woman in love with winter, dropping the
          colored silks." 

--from Jane Hirshfield's "Three Times My Life Has Opened"