spiral
Downward buckle, spin, and arch. Falling head over heals and back againg. Sinking into utter darkness of questions -- questions you don't want to try and answer back to anymore.
There's no escape, that's the story that you're writing now. Maybe it's not so bad -- but it seems to be. The darkness seems to have no end, the questions no purpose, the empty spaces between you and them -- endless. The chasm too wide to cross now, you sit down on the dirt and drop your head to the ground. You're giving up. That's fair enough. But what will it mean tomororw?
Refusing to answer, pretending the spring is here, wondering if the winter will ever be over...
So winter starts when the leaves have finished changing brown and dying, you say. And winter comes when the trees are all dormant and dead and the world looks like there's no life left in it. And the biting cold makes everything feel so much worse than it really should. It comes when death is on the verge of going on forever - taking over life altogether; that's when winter begins. And it looks so much worse than it really is...
Winter's not the real death. Autumn is the death. Winter is the funeral. Winter mourns what autumn destroyed, covering it in a casket of soft white. Laying all the little flowers and leaves to rest under a frozen time-capsule. The animals lie down to sleep, the trees sap freezes - stops flowly. The world becomes so still it almost forgets to move - almost forgets that there is still life - almost forgets to live, forgets that it has to. But winter always comes before fall can destroy entirely.
Spring reminds the seasons, reminds the world that winter triumphed once again over fall - over autumn. Spring with its green leaves and flowers and new baby animals littering the world reminds the soul that winter saved the world at just the right moment - keeping it safe until the cold, dead hand of fall passed over and the world was once again free.
So you see? We've had it wrong for so long. Winter is not a killer. Fall, autumn is the killer - the destroyer, painting lovely pictures for our eyes to mask over death. Creating a kaleidescope of images so that our souls are dulled to the destruction all around us. But winter is never fooled. Winter always comes at just the right instant - to save our worlds from utter ruin.
Once again, winter has come. Frozen, cold, and almost unbearable - it has come to preserve the life that fall almost destroyed. Winter sometimes allows a few shoots of grass - a few signs of a California winter - but then the soft casket lid comes back closed on nature and reminds the world that it is still in mourning, still in rest. Now winter rages on, preserving all the life it can under its cold, shivering hands and its blue, bony fingers.
Strange how winter so quietly hides the most life from our eyes of all the seaons combined. Spring openly lavishes life to the eyes. Summer puts its life to work, plowing and growing and producing. Fall is the knife in the heart that slowly, more like a disease - eats away at the heart of creation, staying all the life that it can. Then winter - the quiet calm, the innocent blamed for all this death - comes and covers over all the life of the world in a thin tapestry. Winter - the most secretive and most silent. It does not boast it's work - it does not brag its safe protection of the world year after year. It's a simple caretaker. It does not claim any ownership to the work it does.
Winter, unlike Spring, simply is about life. It need not show it to anyone. Winter is the ultimate life-force in nature. If only we - the fall leaves and dry, sapless branches - would know who our winter is and that when it comes -- we need it.
-RK
There's no escape, that's the story that you're writing now. Maybe it's not so bad -- but it seems to be. The darkness seems to have no end, the questions no purpose, the empty spaces between you and them -- endless. The chasm too wide to cross now, you sit down on the dirt and drop your head to the ground. You're giving up. That's fair enough. But what will it mean tomororw?
Refusing to answer, pretending the spring is here, wondering if the winter will ever be over...
So winter starts when the leaves have finished changing brown and dying, you say. And winter comes when the trees are all dormant and dead and the world looks like there's no life left in it. And the biting cold makes everything feel so much worse than it really should. It comes when death is on the verge of going on forever - taking over life altogether; that's when winter begins. And it looks so much worse than it really is...
Winter's not the real death. Autumn is the death. Winter is the funeral. Winter mourns what autumn destroyed, covering it in a casket of soft white. Laying all the little flowers and leaves to rest under a frozen time-capsule. The animals lie down to sleep, the trees sap freezes - stops flowly. The world becomes so still it almost forgets to move - almost forgets that there is still life - almost forgets to live, forgets that it has to. But winter always comes before fall can destroy entirely.
Spring reminds the seasons, reminds the world that winter triumphed once again over fall - over autumn. Spring with its green leaves and flowers and new baby animals littering the world reminds the soul that winter saved the world at just the right moment - keeping it safe until the cold, dead hand of fall passed over and the world was once again free.
So you see? We've had it wrong for so long. Winter is not a killer. Fall, autumn is the killer - the destroyer, painting lovely pictures for our eyes to mask over death. Creating a kaleidescope of images so that our souls are dulled to the destruction all around us. But winter is never fooled. Winter always comes at just the right instant - to save our worlds from utter ruin.
Once again, winter has come. Frozen, cold, and almost unbearable - it has come to preserve the life that fall almost destroyed. Winter sometimes allows a few shoots of grass - a few signs of a California winter - but then the soft casket lid comes back closed on nature and reminds the world that it is still in mourning, still in rest. Now winter rages on, preserving all the life it can under its cold, shivering hands and its blue, bony fingers.
Strange how winter so quietly hides the most life from our eyes of all the seaons combined. Spring openly lavishes life to the eyes. Summer puts its life to work, plowing and growing and producing. Fall is the knife in the heart that slowly, more like a disease - eats away at the heart of creation, staying all the life that it can. Then winter - the quiet calm, the innocent blamed for all this death - comes and covers over all the life of the world in a thin tapestry. Winter - the most secretive and most silent. It does not boast it's work - it does not brag its safe protection of the world year after year. It's a simple caretaker. It does not claim any ownership to the work it does.
Winter, unlike Spring, simply is about life. It need not show it to anyone. Winter is the ultimate life-force in nature. If only we - the fall leaves and dry, sapless branches - would know who our winter is and that when it comes -- we need it.
-RK
2 Thought(s):
I like that word picture: Autumn is the death. Winter is the funeral.
*sigh* Thanks. I actually wrote most of this late at night and didn't post it because I wasn't sure it made any sense. I re-read it this morning and realized it did. So I finished it.
Post a Comment
<< Home