Autumnal Variations

There is, of course, no autumn in the tropics,
nor spring, nor winter too.

Here on the Malabar coast, our temperatures vary very little between January and July.
What marks Kerala’s tropical seasons are the monsoon rains.

But deciduous trees must still drop their leaves.
They may fall individually, while the tree remains dressed in full and lustrous foliage.
Or occasionally, a tree will capriciously display its entire autumn wardrobe,
to stand alone in wistful copper tones, against the sea of vibrant greens.

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Photographs all taken in Kerala: the first two pictures shot in the Koottickal foothills of the Western Ghats; the last, a discarded coconut palm “leaf skeleton”, from the Chellanam backwaters.