Sarah Hart

As I stand on the edge of the familiar field the first word to flit into my mind is “bleak”. Another b-word that comes to mind is “beige”. Bleak and beige certainly describe this atmosphere best.Seasonal wither appears to have fully struck the tallest plants of this field. Staring out at the vast sea of dead and dying plants it is hard to believe that it is the same field I had initially begun to observe at the end of summer.

I had watched this field stand tall for months, buzzing with life, insects, flowers, purple, gold, loud. The proud goldenrods, a favorite haunt for many a bumblebee, have been reduced to shriveled stems and fluff. I listen for the almost frightening hum of pollinators doing what they know how to do best. All I hear are mocking crickets. What was once lush is now dust. The only green clings close to the ground. I recall how red the stems of the hemp-dogbane once were, how green their leaves once shone. Even the crimson is now brown and they don’t even stand as tall as they once did. How does the mighty field stoop to this crumbling?

Of course, the collapse didn’t happen all at once. It shouldn’t be such a system shock. Watching the decay of plant life is a continuous tradition that unfolds its brown carpet before us constantly. I am not appalled by the sprawling decay of the leaf litter when I walk through the forest to watch the plants. It feels a natural companion to the towering trees that dropped them there to rot. Perhaps the shock of the dead field comes from how densely packed with life it once was when I first traipsed through it months ago. The forest has a quiet way of decomposing; the silence of the field is loud.

The only way I can learn to take comfort in the quiet of this new season is the certaintainty that the decay of this field reassures the health of new fields to come. These plants aren’t built to last. Decomposition of the broken bits and pieces will fuel the lushness of the spring and summer to come. Insects and worms and little creatures of all sorts are still out there. Quiet ones hidden from my eyes. They churn the dusty plant bits into the soil. Rains will come and dissolve the essential life-giving compounds in these remains and spread them everywhere. Even humans will be participating in this activity as I’ve heard the remaining brown grasses are to be mowed over, torn to little bits. Bits that are perfect for the worms and the fungi and the bacteria hidden from the eye. This is what will help to make the soil that in turn feeds a new crop of plants and this new crop of plants will soon feed the incessant insect hum.

As I walk through the forest I see that the new leaf litter of the season is already turning to the brown I had remembered from months ago. Through this short time the canopy had become yellow, the yellow fell to the ground, and now the yellow has turned mostly brown, no doubt the work of persevering microbes breaking down the plants’ complex molecules into simpler forms. The decay of the forest has an air of serenity to it that does not give away the secret bustle of its process. It is the same decay that I have seen in the fields. Somehow the decomposition seems to suit the slow-paced forest better in my mind. Change feels more gradual. Maybe I just miss the bees.

There will be more time for bees, though. Without the death of the old plants there can be no new plants. Their bodies contain the vital building blocks for new plants and these are precious resources not to be hoarded. With the new plants will come the new bees and thanks to the dreary rot the fields will sing as the forests quietly sprout their new seedlings.