The Value of Leaves

We're at war with leaves!

Everywhere I bike
I see people at battle
with their fallen foes.

With rake...

...tractor...











...and those infernal leaf blowers...




...we stack up god's treasure
to be carted away to
who-knows-where.

I, myself, favor the rake.

Have I told you
I do autopsies?

I've seen the hearts
of men who jog
and men who cut wood.

I know the value
of arm exercise.

And I'll tell you
I'd rather be
the man who rakes.

Have you noticed
those conductors
all live to be one hundred?

I always got my kids
to rake leaves.

But we didn't
throw them away!

We knew that trees
are happiest
with warm leaves
snuggled around their trunks.

The nature of things
is the fall of leaves...

Enriching the soil

Keeping down weeds

Warming the earth
around your trees.

But now we pile the leaves up
unloved
by the street
to be swept away.

As I cruise the streets
I see a mountain of bags
stuffed with precious leaf-stuff.


I used to pay my kids
$1 a bag
to drag these home for me.

Say, what?
I have an empty Prius...

No one is looking...


I hoist the bags in my car
and scurry away
with my booty.

-What have you brought for us?

Help me unload
these leaves, Boys!

There's enough
for both of you!

Kids and dogs
know
the value
of leaves.