Leaves

The cold nip of the fall air. That distinct sound of trudging through freshly fallen leaves. The world's bright greens fading to the warm palette of oranges and browns until everything's dead. It all just leads to more and more of those dumb, little leaves. Millions of them scattered across the ground, forgotten by their branches. Nothing but nature's trash just scattered around the landscape endlessly. Nothing but burdens to those who walk through them, those who have to pick them up. So many swings of that rake, so many trips to the brush pile, just to watch them burn and think 'I'm going to have to do this all over next year'. Hours spent on them for a few dollars, paid to stare into that endless sea of brown and try to make a dent so maybe the grass might one day grow again, but it never will. Green was a foreign color for the dirt of these woods. Not even in the brightest summer day could it finally break through. The sun will never reach those patches of dirt. By the time grass could grow, the leaves will just return to cover it again, whether from their branches or back to the ground.

What are they really good for, all those leaves? Maybe to someone younger than me they might provide a few minutes of fun. To me they're just another year of work, another set of weekends spent at the end of that rake, gathering blisters and boredom. Trading my own effort for the promise of freedom. Just keep raking those leaves; one day you could make a mountain out of them and watch it burn. Watch it all burn to the ground in a tower of smoke and leave behind an ocean of ash to be covered by even more leaves.

What do they do? They hide the dirt from us, they hide the animals. Just forgotten scraps of life from limbs in the sky, getting buried over the years in a torrent of more leaves. Packed down and rotting until it's all just more wet dirt. Those are the hardest to pick up, the ones at the bottom. All fused together from time and neglect. They might as well just be dirt at that point, so why even bother raking them? More leaves will just come back next year and bury them again. Why try to fight that cycle? I never really understood.

How much is lost in them? An old ring, someone's bracelet. A forgotten cassette, an empty bottle. An unearthed worm, a crushed snake. Easily avoidable had they been above the leaves, but now they just flail about, broken bones and cut skin. They wait for something to put them out of their misery, or fight against inevitable death until it finally catches up with them. As the life fades out of them they relax into the leaves, never to try and move again. They wait months or even years to be buried by that endless stream of autumn rain. One more year and it'll all be gone without a trace. One more year until they're just bones hiding in the leaves. Waiting for eternity just under the first layer. Just keep waiting for those leaves to fall again.