This article**: People**Overseas Edition.
Liu Jiangbin. People's ** Overseas Edition (December 22, 2023 Edition 07).
After the beginning of winter, there was a trip to Henan. Driving on the highway, I saw that the trees on both sides of the road were still green, but the aspen was half empty, only a few leaves remained at the top of the tree, curly, looking from afar, as if there were dark green birds perched on the treetops. It's just that these "birds" are afraid that they will disappear like yellow cranes in a short time.
When a leaf falls, you know that the world is autumn. In winter, most of the leaves are still stubbornly attached to the branches. As the weather gets colder, most of the leaves will gradually drift away except for pine and cypress and other tree species, and all the leaves will fall in the cold winter, leaving only bare branches.
The leaves are the hair of the tree. The leaves sprout branches from spring, verdant and dripping, to summer a tree flourishes, lush and vigorous, as if the beauty of a black hair like a waterfall, wind and rain comb, shaking people's hearts. In autumn and winter, the hair of the trees becomes thin, mottled and empty.
However, defoliation is also a way for trees to protect themselves. As the sun moves south, the weather is cold, and the leaves are falling, the trees no longer need to transport additional water, but store them in their trunks, waiting for the warmth of the coming year to complete another cycle of life.
Ancient poets were very sensitive to the change of the four seasons, especially when they saw the fallen leaves and felt sad, such as "sad autumn is also angry, and the bleak grass and trees shake down and decay" (Song Yu). As a member of nature, it is normal for human feelings and feelings to resonate with natural things at the same frequency, and to be one between nature and man.
But the fallen leaves bring people not only frustration, but also beauty and fun.
In late autumn and early winter, if you sit under a tree, you can see a leaf quietly falling. If this is a relatively large sycamore leaf, then it has a posture of falling, although silently, but it is also completing a solemn ritual - parting with the branches, whirling, slowly floating and sinking in the air, like dancing gracefully, quietly sliding, and finally prostrate leisurely on the chest of Mother Earth.
When I woke up, the wind blew last night, and the leaves were falling, and the ground was brown, gray, yellow, and red, colorful. In my eyes, these fallen leaves are a landscape, a gift from nature, and it is a pity to see them swept away by the cleaners. Sometimes I go to the park or the woods in the suburbs, and the fallen leaves have accumulated a thick layer on the ground, as if a carpet has been laid out, and walking on it is soft, soft, and comfortable. There are also children or young people, sitting or lying on the fallen leaves, or even rolling and tossing;Others hold a handful of hands and scatter them into the sky, creating a "leaf snow" and watching the leaves flutter and fall. Isn't that the joy that fallen leaves bring to people?
However, how many people appreciate the green leaves when the leaves grow on the trees?When people go out on a trip or in the park, they take out their phones and take crazy pictures of the flowers, but they often turn a blind eye to the green leaves of the trees. And when the leaves turn yellow and red, they attract everyone's attention, as the Tang Dynasty poet Du Mu said: "Stop and sit in love with the maple forest at night, and the frost leaves are red in February." "Probably because the leaves at this time have the attributes of flowers, the shape of flowers, and the color of flowers. Fallen leaves are different, although they are withered, they have their own unique beauty, a kind of beauty that has no desires and no desires, and is tranquil and peaceful. It has a beautiful posture compared to when it grows on a tree.
Every time you see fallen leaves. I always go back to the old days. When I was a child, my family was in the countryside, and in winter, the children's usual work was to string leaves. Take a few long thick hemp ropes, with a needle at one end and a wooden stick at the other, run into the woods, prick a leaf with a needle, and pull it to the end, and it will not take long to string a rope. When a few ropes are full, they are carried in their hands or carried on their shoulders to take home as firewood. Stringing leaves, in fact, has the nature of a child's play, which is both work and play, so it is full of interest. If you are older, you will use a basket to hold the fallen leaves, and the basket will be filled with three times or two strokes.
Falling red is not a ruthless thing, turning into spring mud is more protective of flowers", "falling red" is talking about flowers, in fact, it can also be said that fallen leaves. In the reckless forest, the leaves fall to the ground, layer upon layer, month after year, after wind and rain erosion, mud cover cover, gradually become humus, into organic fertilizer, to the roots of the tree to deliver nutrients, just as a song sings "this is the friendship of green leaves to roots". In the countryside in the past, in addition to burning fallen leaves as firewood, more was manure. Throw the collected leaves and weeds into the pigsty, and then spread a layer of dry soil on it, let the pigs trample and roll, and over time, get out of the pit, which is the best fertilizer. In today's cities, one of the places where fallen leaves go is the power plant, which sends light to people with the last burning.
The leaves sprout, flourish and wither, from nothing to something, and from existence to nothing, the cycle is endless. The leaves have fallen, and next spring there will be a new green arching out of the branches.