All around us now, the trees are playing dead. There are no leaves or flowers. No birds sing in their branches, and no insects hum in their canopy. No sap runs, no resin drips. They do not whisper anymore when the wind blows. Now they just creak as they rock back and forth, brittle and rigid. There is no soft scent of greenery coming from them, no moisture to be felt, no protection from the elements. They no longer offer us stability and steadfastness. There is no comfort.
I can’t tell the difference now between the trees that are
alive and those that have already been dead for some time. In summer it’s simple, of course, because
they are so dramatically different. But
in the winter when the living trees pretend to be dead, who can say which is alive
and which is dead? They do such a good
job of mimicking death.
Or is it that the dead trees are doing a fine job of
mimicking the living trees? Really, we
can’t be certain anymore. In the season
of death, anything is possible. The dead
trees are behaving very much like the living trees, and the living trees could
win an award for playing dead. They are
just playing, aren’t they?
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| Living or dead? What's the difference? |
