Winter

For some reason, whenever I see frost on the window, it makes me cry. I'm not quite sure why, but I'm sure it has something to do with the fact that frost is a sign of Winter, and Winter is the time when things die for the year. Of course, I know that Winter isn't necessarily a time of sadness. Once Spring comes, everything comes back to life again, so Winter gives the world a chance to be reborn, to become new again. But still, that temporary death, knowing that the flowers from this year will not be back again as they once were... That makes me sad.

I cry when I see the snow falling silently from the sky, when I see the ice coating the trees after a storm, when I see the delicate figures on the window in the morning, beautiful in their own way, but still a sign of everything that goes against my own nature. I cry, and I die a little myself. I am a creature of the Summer, of the flowers and the grass, and of the young animals just starting to learn the ways of the world. I know nothing of this time of cold and sleep, and I lament that I cannot join my followers in their sleeps during this sad time.

I was asked once why I still exist during the Winter, when the world is at the opposite end from everything I represent. I was asked once how I can persist when all my people have moved on to the next phase of the year, leaving only myself stuck in the same state, even as the world changes with them. I was asked once whether I may one day move on to the Fall of my life, just as my brethren have.

All I can say is that I do not know.

I am a creature of the Summer, but at the same time I am Summer, and that differentiates me from my children. They move in a different realm from the one in which I move. They move with Time, changing as She coaxes them along the paths of their lives. Time moves around me, not bothering to take me along on Her journey, even though at times I would like nothing more than to be given that chance. For some reason, I am able to exist outside of the time that is myself, and that is something that will continue to baffle me for the rest of eternity. Until then, all I can do is cry at the end of everything that is familiar to me, and hope that one day I can join my children in their rest during that time.