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Being In The World

Everything is like steel today, grey and thick in it's undercurrent of cold. Just touching the surface of everything; radiation. The people can feel it coming from the nothing sky. They can feel it from the hydro poles, the sidewalks and the earth, up from the dirt. Soft, cool and grainy between your fingers. How tricked the fingertips get, feeling a wetness that is not there.
Today is the day where you can feel each breath, your nose is alive.
And your bones, they almost tremor, they almost ache because they feel hollow from the chill in the air.
The wind blows heavy, trailing her own fingers up through the trees. Oh, and the leaves shake.
If is was spring, we would smile at their dance!
But when we look now, we notice more gaps between the leaves and branches. We can start to look through and see what lies beyond. More sky.
Look at the death apparent. The green leaves darker, starting to spot with brown, crinkled and curled in edges. Clinging. Wasting. Wasted. Born into death together.
Aren't we always so amazed by that last leaf of autumn? The one who just will not let go of the tree long past the time it should have? How lone it looks, up so high. Like a star, I suppose.
And we feel proud. Amazed by the wonder, the strength, the against-all-odds of this lone, little leaf that chooses to hang on.
We feel proud of the dependent.
We seldom remember the green leaf of July. The one on the ground beneath the tree. The one we just walked right on by, maybe we were too busy being happy with the sun.
But the green leaf was there.
And if we had been paying attention, we would have seen it roll away.
Being in life.

Comments

Anonymous said…
wonderful...i love it...
cbeck said…
This is beautiful. Well played. I have not stopped to watch the leafs enough this year.
Jennifer said…
Beautiful Q. I never thought anyone saw this the way I do... and lucky enough for me you have such a gift with words. :)
Traci Dolan said…
Breath-taking... have missed you so since my computer has been on the fritz... can't wait for my daily dose of Queenie to return.

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