Winter

The trees are naked now. Oh, there are a few leaves hanging on, but on the whole the limbs are bare - the trunks and branches, appearing barren and lifeless to the observing human eye -stretching toward the sky . Lately, there has been more wind here in North Carolina - reminiscent of Oklahoma - shifting the branches back and forth without the protective covering of the leaves.

It makes me wonder - this plan of nature that is so different from human thinking. When winter arrives, humans shrivel up and pack on layers of clothing to protect themselves from the cold. Not nature, though, the trees seem to make the most of their nakedness - expanding - stretching - reaching toward the sky - almost an unawareness that their covering of leaves is as gone as the warm fall days. Human thinking would have placed the leaves on the trees in the winter for protection from the elements and stripped them naked in the summer - but not so nature.

So what is the meaning of all this? Why do humans only see the barrenness of the winter landscape - forgetting that nothing ever really dies - just changes form. In reality, the naked trucks and branches are in a constant state of readiness - their soul alive and ready to bear new life under the warmth of the spring sun. And like all humans, I long for that moment, when those first tiny buds begin to appear like goosebumps along the surface of the branches - reminding us that although naked, the branches have housed life all along - just waiting for the right moment to spring forth once again.

In the meantime, though, it is winter. And I think of friends of mine who are in the winter of their life -- some lying in bed, unable to support the weight of the leaves of their spring, summer, and fall any longer - yet beautiful as they reach toward the spring of a new life.

And I can choose how I see them -- like the trees. I can choose to see them as naked, nearly lifeless branches - exposed to the harsh elements of winter; or I can choose to see them naked, unashamed, releasing the dead leaves of the past, reaching beyond the harshness of the winter of this life, and stretching toward the spring of a new life. I can see the beauty of the life within them, the soul that lives again and again - though in different forms. And like the trees, who new leaves this spring will never be the same leaves that fell last fall, my friends will live again, springing forth in newness of life - in a new form --because the Tree of Life never dies - ever reaching - stretching - expanding (even in its nakedness) toward the warmth of the Sun of God.

© 2006 Ilene Madrigal

“But just remember in the Winter
Far beneath the bitter snows
Lies the seed that with the Sun’s Love
In the Spring becomes the Rose!”

“The Rose” sung by Bette Midler