The amber leaf releases its hold on the branch, slowly swoops and spins toward the ground as a playful breeze moves the canopy above in a peaceful rhythm. One curled leaf at a time gives in to its destiny as nourishment for the soil below while a grey squirrel lopes across the forest floor, crunching the papery thin leaves with each hop. Out of nowhere, a chipmunk scampers over the rocks then ducks underneath a fallen log. Insects buzz and dart in the air. The transience of autumn is a feast for the senses and prompts wonderment at the circle of life.
With purpose the trees sluff their foliage, revealing bare, exposed and naked branches. Pondering our connection with creation, picture yourself as the tree or the leaf that clings to its knotty bough. With vulnerability and a beginner’s mind, the search for a real and authentic self unfolds while nature reveals a shedding of the old, baring gnarled limbs. The autumn season prompts a holy nakedness in us as we embody its vulnerable shift.
See with every turning day,
how each season wants to make a child
of you again, wants you to become
a seeker after rainfall and birdsong,
watch now, how it weathers you to a testing
in the tried and true, tells you
with each falling leaf, to leave and slip away,
even from that branch that held you,
to go when you need to, to be courageous,
to be like that last word you’d want to say
before you leave the world.
David Whyte, in his poem “Coleman’s Bed,” draws us deeper into the desire of the soul in its search for freedom and wholeness. Stay for a while in the quiet of his words, breathing in God’s grace and self-compassion, breathing out fear and doubt.
Above all, be alone with it all,
a hiving off, a corner of silence
amidst the noise, refuse to talk,
even to yourself, and stay in this place
until the current of the story
is strong enough to float you out.
Like the new leaves of springtime that need room to emerge and bud, the poem speaks of the fragility of life. The ego doesn’t care for this idea. It would rather remain attached, giving us the impression that all is well as long as we control the outcome. Like the hidden cucumber hidden underneath the leaves of the vine still attached in late September, swollen and bitter to the taste, slowing down the plant’s growth. It clings to its life source but starves it of its nutrients.
What am I clinging to that needs to be released from my grip? How am I wishing for things to remain just as they are? Is God perhaps nudging me to welcome something new? Is it my bare soul, naked before God, that I try to hide with my newest strivings, my climb to perfection, my inclinations to self-preservation?
Take a walk today if you can and breathe in and taste autumn’s succulent feast. What seeks your attention on your own path to new life?
