Like Leaves

By: Dakota R.

There’s always been something attractive about the grand season of autumn. A transitional phase. Life prepares to sleep. If one were to look out the window at the right time of day, one might see a rabbit, or a squirrel, or even a raccoon. They’ll rustle the corpses of fallen leaves, crunchy little play toys sprawled out like a carpet on the soil. 

But what of those leaves before they fall?

There’s an unexplainable splendor to the colors brought about by autumn. Though the greens are not as bright and the sky is not as blue, the leaves of the trees become a symphony of reds, oranges, and yellows. The light that the sun casts feels more golden than usual, the shade subtler and easier on the eyes simply because of the Earth’s tilt.

In a way, I find myself relating to the autumn leaves. The season has always been a favorite of mine with its warm spices and cool breezes. But as for the leaves themselves, there’s a sense of peace amongst them. Quiet observers that rustle softly in the open air amongst their peers. They whisper, they coat the branches of trees, yet no one seems to pay them any mind. They perch high above the ground to survey the domain of their brethren. And when their time comes, they fall. They know their place, and they do not overstay their welcome. In some cases, they leave early. They peacefully flutter down from their wooden abode without disturbing a single thing around them, taking with themselves all their wondrous secrets.

If a leaf could talk, what would it say? Would it comment on the weather? Would it sing its dreams about dancing through the wind? Would it feel anguish as it watches a fellow leaf succumb to a fate of being devoured alive slowly and surely by aphids?

A leaf is to the world as a quiet student is to the classroom. Not a thing of drama and trouble, just quiet, calm, observing the world around itself. But a leaf can have its troubles too. Overcome by sorrow, nearly swept off its branch by a gale, barely hanging by that last tendon, the leaf trembles. Every vein feels overwhelmed by the storm, wishing it would end.

I am a leaf, life blown through torrents as I watch my father succumb to cancer like a feeble plant beset to vicious pests. I feel some days as though I’m barely stuck on this branch by a tendon, confused and sorrowful. Upon my branch, I reach out, looking for my sunshine. 

        Art is there, reaching back with blinding warmth. Getting lost drifting across the pond that is my imagination, my little leaf self wanders. I flourish when I develop my own worlds, my own little people to live in them. I soar on a breeze when I sing. I glide and dip and dance through the air as I draw the characters in my mind, paying tribute to the little imaginary people that have altered my leafy structure for the better. When all is said and done, I can look around and feel at peace when I’m in my own little bubble. On my branch, swaying to my own breeze, enjoying the quiet of the woods whilst left to my own devices.

But eventually, fall will arrive. I will fade my youthful green shade and instead transform myself into a marvelous crimson or amber. And then once I’m good and ripe and ready to fully part with my childhood ways, I will descend from my homey branch and make my way down to the forest floor where all of the leaves will eventually wind up. And amidst a bath of all my fellow fallen leaves, I will begin anew, ready to begin the formidable journey of being an adult, doing adult things, and being one with the nature of humanity.