twins

colour of the worlds within

Leaves in Waiting

Close to the Wind Close to God

The Fall

The Fall 30th May 2008 8.40am
Yesterday there was hardly a breeze but this morning the slightest breeze sends them tumbling. I just saw a fluted winged plane leaf that soared, glided but held its course... Some of them spin, actually most spin, but some glide as a seagull might - wow. Today, this second last day of May the leaves are falling more than I have seen on other days. Most seem priming in their aircraft hanger branches waiting for the word to come when they spread their foliage and fall.

King of Peace

http://www.mcsr.olemiss.edu/~mudws/sounds/King_of_Peace.mp3

The Mother and her Garden called Eden

The Mother and her Garden called Eden 29th May 2008 9.30am
Ecclesiasticus 24:13 I was exalted like a cedar in Libanus, and as a cypress tree upon the mountains of Hermon.
Ecclesiasticus 24:14 I was exalted like a palm tree in En-gaddi, and as a rose plant in Jericho, as a fair olive tree in a pleasant field, and grew up as a plane tree by the water.
Ecclesiasticus 24:15 I gave a sweet smell like cinnamon and aspalathus, and I yielded a pleasant odour like the best myrrh, as galbanum, and onyx, and sweet storax, and as the fume of frankincense in the tabernacle.
Ecclesiasticus 24:16 As the turpentine tree I stretched out my branches, and my branches are the branches of honour and grace.
Ecclesiasticus 24:17 As the vine brought I forth pleasant savour, and my flowers are the fruit of honour and riches.
Ecclesiasticus 24:18 I am the mother of fair love, and fear, and knowledge, and holy hope: I therefore, being eternal, am given to all my children which are named of him.
Ecclesiasticus 24:19 Come unto me, all ye that be desirous of me, and fill yourselves with my fruits.
Ecclesiasticus 24:20 For my memorial is sweeter than honey, and mine inheritance than the honeycomb. (http://www.biblicalproportions.com/modules/ol_bible/King_James_
Bible/Ecclesiasticus/24/).

Nakedness in the garden

Nakedness in the garden 29th May 2008 9.20am
One wonders what the garden called Eden looked like? Paradise, some call it. But what if the story of Eve and Adam's 'nakedness' was a metaphor and a gardener's attention to the plane tree's loss of bark? And what if the loss of bark was a gardener's signifier of the coming spring and all its possibilities? What if in its nakedness, the tree's new skin was a signpost for when s/he should do certain things that guide one's gardening calculation and preparation? For it is written, (see below) that the,

PLANE TREE - plan'-tre ('armon; platanos (Gen 30:37), elate ("pine" or "fir") (Ezek 31:8); the King James Version chestnut): `Armon is supposed to be derived from the root aram, meaning "to be bare" or "naked"; this is considered a suitable term for the plane, which sheds its bark annually. The chestnut of the King James Version is not an indigenous tree, but the plane (Planus orientalis) is one of the finest trees in Palestine, flourishing especially by water courses (compare Ecclesiasticus 24:14).
(http://net.bible.org/dictionary.php?word=Plane%20tree).

Set Free

Set free 9.20pm 28-05-08
We have such little time, walking, living as we do between spring and winter.
"I'm in the summer of my life, I've seen the good times and I've seen the strife..." (Archie Roach).
And are we aware that we as leaves are perpetually falling?
Some might say that it is the wind, at season's end that breaks our hold and sets us free.
But that same wind comes throughout and with every season.
Blowing strongly in the easterly winds and in the Fremantle doctor's afternoon breeze, absorbs and pushes the heat haze, which soon withdraws and they such leaves who cannot bend soon all but disappear.
It's life's journey, those who are flexible survive and prosper, those who rest too upright in the branches are too often caught by surprise, humbled in their demise...
Plane leaves are flexible - they have at least taught me that.
Equally, they spread themselves before the midday sun and when their work is done they rest - hang limp upon the branch.
They live in community and carry the burden of falling drops, that shatter, but harm them not.
And then, when the nearby Illawarra has dropped her handbag of coloured red lips that all her winged lovers have there in kissed, the leaves of the Plane begin to turn.
Hardly noticeable at first they quicken as the days grow shorter.
The air grows cooler and their solar sails fade to yellow, then brittle winged brown.
Till like today they become paper planes thrown by an invisible hand, their grip unloosened, unleashed, they are finally, set free.

Paper gliders

Paper gliders May 28th 12.00pm
Like in autumn-automatic the leaves disconnect from their branches.
Like as if remote-controlled, these paper gliders with eagles wings are falling.
Their initial velocity points them downwards and then they bottom out and soar.
The earth beyond my window looks like a classroom floor, where trunks are the legs of chairs and beneath them the remnants of childhood paper planes remain, all childhood attempts at origami, their paper birds lie scattered.
This window is a cinema screen and the trees hide their secret paper messages, everywhere they are falling - in a brief moment of time they flicker and glide, some perform their art better than others, dazzling in their brilliance that inspired birds to grow feathers.
God is moving there, in the wind that moves the branches and in the wind that enchants the air.
These leaves or solar sails careering, paper planes with messages in their wings.
Coloured leaves carrying memories of summer now bowing before the winter gale, carrying their messages of the coming spring.
If I stood outside I would hear them singing now nourished with my belief inside that I can hear them sing.

Leaves Turning Brown

Leaves Turning Brown 23-05-08 Friday 5.02pm

The days are growing shorter.
Winter is approaching and the margins of the plain leaves beyond my window are browning growing ever deeper.
My lovely green leaves are being sapped of their life.
My hand-in-date is looming and all the threads of my thesis are being spun together. I want more time, I need more time... in my head there are deadlines, chapters to be corrected, handed back in and re-corrected again - got to make that diamond shine.
And, all the while, the leaves outside show the end of my scholarship getting ever more closer.
I did my word count today, 94000 not counting footnotes. Somewhere I have to squeeze in my lit review, thesis outline and a conclusion. It's going to be a big one.
I pity the poor librarian stacking the shelves... Oh well, back to it.

Destiny

Little Tree

Entirety

Colours at Rest

Beak, Neck and Wing

Colours of the Rainbow

The Crow and the Rainbow

The Crow and the Rainbow (2nd May 2008 5pm)

The marauder was staking its claim today. One crow had seen me through my window watching it eyeing off the carcass of a rainbow lorikeet. Its paranoia knew no bounds and it trod ever-careful with watchful eyes, plotting the movement of my head to see if I posed a threat to its carnivore desires.
I later went to the lorikeet before I left on my own excursion to the cafe to (like the crow) feed my hunger and quench my thirst. But before I did I stopped at the dead lorikeet and took several close-up photos of its bright coloured plumage (photos forthcoming).
At the sight of my arrival, the ever-watchful crow on the lower limb of the platanus flew out of sight and disappeared behind the Murraya hedge. And once there in the garden, something else caught my attention, for I spied under the Illawarra, a younger Illawarra (its sibling perhaps at least I think it was a Illawarra..?) seedling rising from near the limestone border right near the wall and my window.
And upon my return to my desk I once again saw the return of the watchful crow. It knew I was there at my desk, but I bent backwards so it could not see me. And so without sighting my figure through the window it quickly took command of the carcass and attempted to whisk it away in its beak. But, when I stood up and tried to photograph its attempts, with it possibly fearing the sight of my form and watchful stance at the window, it quickly dropped the carcass and flew away. Why it would fear my presence I did not know.
Crows are usually a lot smarter than that, and they will normally take far greater risks than that posed by the sight of me. Maybe it wasn't that hungry. Maybe easier and more tastier morsels were to be found from pilfering the university's bins. It is, after all, the doyen of scavengers and eating from bins is where its real skills come to the fore.
Note: I suspect that my description of the window being 'my window' is inadequate and only half true.
The crow's actions prove that he had an eye into my world as I had an eye into his.
His attention to me was matched by my attention to him.
This window is thus equally his (or hers) and the birds that abound beyond are thus equals to me and my growing craft and awareness of watching, of 'seeing' and of course, being seen.