The Leaf

Photo: Nancy Bauer, OSB

I have been picking up leaves lately.  It is the season, of course, to wonder and explore the beauty of each leaf. Each one carries its own color and design, yet collectively they radiate the splendor and beauty of God’s creation. Paradoxically this collective beauty ushers in the season of bleakness and desolation.

Yet we can’t forget how each leaf started and was born. It was a tiny unfurling bud and beauty that sparkled in the sun. It strove for the light, reaching up through the canopy of branches and fluttered in the wind. Then one day it had grown old and was losing its hold on the branch that had carried it, its family. The tree that had sustained it began to direct its nutrients to other newer leaves and gradually its hold became weaker and weaker until finally it had to let go and it fell and floated to the earth, to feed the very tree that gave it life in its death.

The perfect balance of sun, wind and water that the leaf had thrived and lived and died in ... When I contemplate the grove of trees or the forest, there are millions of leaves, millions of perfectly balanced evolving little lives of perfectly circular motions of nature. Yet I realize that I am following exactly the same journey. I am always amazed how nature shares the deeper incarnational truths of our spiritual journey and our need for balance and perspective. So when it’s your time to let go- do the leaf jiggle, the hip hop dance, or float in serenity to continue the cycle of life – there is a season for everything.

Trish Dick, OSB