Bigleaf Maple

Near the southwestern corner of my property stands a bigleaf maple tree. The surrounding firs are taller; they shoot up like arrows, denying their indebtedness to earth. The maple spreads its muscular canopy in a broad, rounded dome that echoes its mother’s ever-pregnant belly.

One of the best things about trees is that they stay put. Trees are not transient; they don’t change their minds about where they want to live. So when one vacates its place, the spirit of that locale changes.

A few winters ago it lost a large limb in a storm. The following summer I climbed the bank, picking my way through tangles of ivy and blackberry vines. I carried a bow saw, thinking to harvest a few armfuls of firewood from the fallen branches.

I was surprised to find the wood was already rotten from the inside out. It turns out that bigleafs are susceptible to a blight that causes them to fall apart. Few stand for more than a couple of decades.

The tree’s imminent demise has not dimmed its palette. Each autumn its leaves are transformed from sweet green to Van Gogh strokes of ochre, lemon, russet, and flame. It is a fountain of oxygen and color telling a story about the dignity of ending.