Matt Rosenthal How beautifully leaves grow old.

How full of light and color are their last days. - John Burroughs

My Dream Leaves

I take a leaf from its mother tree, I hesitated at first, And after a few days, The leaf, once crisp and full of water, is now drained. The skin, once green and transparent in the sunlight, Turned black, brittle veins crumble in my palm, And light is no longer recycled, reused. Light no longer gives life, it only adds to the drying effect. The leaf, in its last hour, was nothing but dust.

The cremation of a dream. How bewildering it is to think, That the dream I knew, Is like the leaf I took from the tree. Will it come back? Do I want it to come back? I look at the leaf in my hand, Not a leaf anymore, Just a bland collection of molecules. But as there will be other leaves, there will be other dreams, Dreams filled with light and color, Never ending. And those dreams, Are mine for the taking.