Beautiful Death, Bring me to Life

On our way to Applebutter fun, the front seat members of our party were rather excited about the beauty surrounding us as we drove, exclaiming at regular intervals 'look at the beautiful colors!', 'look at the beautiful sky!', 'look at those beautiful trees!', etc....

After awhile, a voice piped up from behind, and said:

'I hesitate to mention it in such company....',

and proceeded to expostulate how the beauty of the leaves we were vociferating over were really just evidence of death.  

Which is depressing.

[Someone is not an early riser...]

Silenced, we drove on, quietly ruminating on the gloom and doom emanating from the back seat.  As I gazed at the intense reds, oranges, and golds framing the mountainous countryside around us, I found myself re-living a day, long ago, along the canal bank in Princeton. I experienced again the flavor of that solitary walk, smelt the beauty of the fall day, felt the intensity of the sun on the changing leaves as I sat down to think.  

I remembered the power of the thought that came to me then 

[as it had recently come to our now napping back seat, 

if in slightly different form]:  

The leaves that bring such life to my day, warm me with their glorious color, and remind me that my God is creative above all else, can do so because they are dying.  Weird.

Well, wouldn't you know that all of this ruminating got my philosopher blood boiling early in the day, and so I found myself on the look out for all things related to living and dying as the morning moved forward.

So, get ready, because this is what I found:

[Theme 1: Wisdom Whispers]

Settling on foundations that have earned their place in time,

that which is closer to the end than the beginning
reminds you of where you've been,

 it tells you what worked; it tells you what didn't.  It helps you, as you seek to understand what you need in order to go to the next. 

It wants also to tell of nostalgia,

 and remembers the role of whimsy.

{Sit quietly, and listen to its insight.}

[Theme 2: Seek your Landscape]

Take a walk through a field,

 seemingly past its prime.

 Breathe in, imagine what had been here.

 Then imagine--it will be again;

it's what your landscape is made of.  

{Seek what makes your landscape yours.}

[Theme 3: Decay Happens]

As all that spoke of summer recedes into dull and brittle,

what once reigned in authority

now deposits nutrients.

Necessary, 

as investment in the soil.

In such, new growth abides.

{Allow for decay, wait for fertile soil.}

[Theme 4: How it Is in Me.]

The characteristics of the old, 

broken down over intense heat,

with steam spewing everywhere,

provides for delicious.

{Trust the beauty of the Death; 

it will bring you into Life.}