Rising man

There's a rising man forever frozen in the naked branches of the giant oak tree outside my bedroom window.  The oak grows up way past the third floor windows and towers over the roof, but the rising man is whole there, outside my room.  His modesty is preserved by the main trunk where he originates. Clear as day, each fall after the leaves drop, you see the back of his leg, bent at the knee, his midrift and shoulders lifting up, one arm out as if to catch himself and one arm reaching up.  The pose radiates strength, growth, unfolding.

He has no choice about being humble and patient, being made of oak and bark and all.  Squirrels race up and down his back and neck, chasing, jumping and tumbling over one another. He has made peace with the gray ones, the little red guys and the black ones.  He's pestered by some lovely woodpeckers - three toed, ladder-backed, red bellied, red headed, downy. He never flinches. And nuthatches, titmice, sparrows, bluebirds, jays and cardinals shelter and hop around, sharpening beaks, waiting their turns at the feeders.

I am always so glad to see him each year.  He helps me not to mourn the green and golden.  To love the still, textured potential of this dormant phase.  It's magnificent.  We should pause, rest, shelter and romp during this time.  It's the before and the after and right now.  You can see nothing more in him than what was lost, what is long in coming, what he cannot do.  Or  you can see his unmoving latency, stillness as beautiful and alive, full of magic and potential.