The Last to Go

It feels nearly complete, this Autumn turning. The trees, which have obscured my view of the mountains and the park since April, are little more than jagged charcoal lines bending and twisting into the sharp November sky. They are like fat, dark arteries fanning out into winding veins that end in a finger-like splay of capillaries, reaching into nothingness. And yet even they––bland and colorless––are beautiful in their starkness.

The Lindens were the last to let go. Their leaves held on, resisting the weight of our two October snow storms, curled up into tight knots around themselves, as brown as leather, as crisp as paper and as fierce as fists. And when they let go they did it all at once, a multitude in solidarity against the changing of the season. Our streets and lawns are covered with them, nearly knee deep in places. Duncan likes to run through them, pushing against them as he pushes through the water of the summer river, his chest heaving forward as his body rises and falls through their depths.

And though they are dead and will soon be buried and forgotten, their music is loud and true and, while it lasts, the most beautiful sound in all of Autumn.