Leaves are falling.
Little ones and medium-sized. There’s a wide variety of species in Prospect
Park, and I’m thinking these slender ones, prematurely yellow and brittle from
the days of scorching heat and high humidity, are from a black cherry tree.
That is what I
feel myself as I catch one, the first leaf of 2018, got to be the earliest I’ve
ever caught a leaf on the run, thrilled to have it but alarmed that leaves are
falling so early in the year. Seasons heating, if you ask me, or anyone who
doesn’t have an agenda.
The run is my
second since we returned from an Italian holiday. Did my darndest to keep
political news at bay but upon return am struck by how the silos of political
opinion have hardened.
What can we agree
on? Perhaps a leaf? Which by coincidence just happened to be the first note I
made in a journal that I bought for this trip.
It was twilight
(June 16) and a light breeze was blowing:
“Leaves dry and
brittle, some
in constant
motion, and
in the foreground
the tufted
swath taking
whatever
force the moving
air gathers,
a gentle wind to
driving
rainstorm, nothing
but to
do their part and
defend,
protect the whole.
Damn, how humans
can learn from trees.
What seems ever
more true
in hot, dry
climates like this
one. Nature shows
us the way,
leaves as people,
ants and ant
societies. When we
lose sight
of the big picture,
trying to
forge solutions
that will, at
best as we are to
manage, support
life, pride and
respect for those
born in our time,
then what good
are we? Can we
simply carve ourselves
a sliver of space
and give succor
to only our
friends and loved ones?
Or dig a hole and
plant a tree.
Go home and walk a
dog. We are nothing
compared to that.
We unenlightened
weak-willed humans,
who would
not do our part in
the best way
and most noble
intent to husband
with the strength
and power of a just society,
are not deserving
of being
seen as admirable
as a single leaf.”
Next: “Inadvertent” by Karl Ove Knausgaard
