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59 BEFORE LEAVES FALL, SNOW how they suffer. They bow, they don’t die. Snow arches, boosted by bent wood— rude cathedrals. Gravity and ravens shake loose dry snow. A lone birch straightens toward sky. Laden birch stay bent all winter, bent always, bow down even in full sun to earth, rich, made of birch. Some still green, leaves cling, catch snow loads so heavy the birches bend double. Just one tall tree bent into wire zaps out what we call power. Birch trees take on burdens they could never have predicted, hold on too long to last year’s leaves. Interrupted, they can’t finish letting go, and so they show us ...

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