autumn monologue

12/11/19

The Japanese have a word for beauty that comes from impermanence and decay, called wabi sabi. Autumn, to me, is the aesthetic culmination of this ideal. The leaves, bright red, scorched orange, seem more alive than anything before they turn dark and lose their fire. To look and be affected by a blazing canopy of red and yellow, to be in the woods walking on a carpet of crisp crunchy leaves; it's pretty but it's also wonderful - and it probably comes from being suddenly acutely subconsciously aware of "now" and how it's already gone. Bold and bright and then gone in an instant, feels like a cruel trick. It's a melancholy type of magic, because in a way the trees are telegraphing their demise. The whole tableau seems to be saying 'okay... I'm leaving now... for real. I'll see you next year...' As if one foot's out the door already. You can't appreciate the beauty of autumn without registering that it will be gone soon - and that somehow heightens the experience. You begin to anticipate its absence and it fills you with a preemptive sense of loss and longing. It's a reminder, a little jolt to the system. For a few precious moments, makes you appreciate everything more, not just the leaves, but the wind on your face. The cold air as you breathe in. the sounds of rustling in the distance. The feeling of being alive.

Everything becomes a little sharper. A little clearer. A little realer. Autumn is totemic; poignant without parallel; poetic, graceful and tragic; demonstrative / emblematic of every vanished moment you wish you could relive. Here's the crux of it probably: autumn is magical because you wish it would stay, but know that it can't.

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'...but from then on the sound of a party would have a sad magic'