Thought Bubble: Japanese Maple in Autumn

At this time of year, the maple at the bottom of our garden is a scintillating conflagration of reds, oranges, and purples. When the slanting autumnal sun strikes the tree’s canopy it blazes out like a beacon against the thickening darkness.

We planted our maple a couple of years after we moved into the house. It is a shared tenement garden but the maintenance fell on us, partly because we are a ground floor flat with direct access to the garden but mostly because the previous tenant was such a keen horticulturist that she had taken complete ownership of the space. We inherited her kingdom.

Neither of us were gardeners when we arrived. At first, we were hesitant to make changes. Our predecessors beloved roses stayed awhile, and the ugly hedge that screened the path to the bowling club that runs alongside continued to grow unchecked until it became a shaggy monstrosity, blocking precious sunlight. We entered our garden as if encroaching on foreign territory: this was not yet our kingdom.

The maple was one of our first attempts to take ownership, and we planted it more in hope than expectation. We had no idea if the soil would meet its nutritional needs or if the position we chose by the back wall would afford it enough light. We dug a hole, heeled the roots in and hoped for the best. Surprisingly, despite our ignorance, the tree thrived and grew until it became the beautiful, burning highlight of our autumnal garden.

I love to sit under its slender boughs in high summer when the outer leaves are scarlet and their soft undersides a light green. Sitting in their shade is like submerging myself in an underwater cave with light piercing down from a faraway ocean surface. While enjoying the cool air and resting my eyes on the calming leaf glow I often reflect upon my favourite short story by J R R Tolkien, Leaf by Niggle.

Niggle is a man who is creating a vast picture of an imaginary tree but who can never find the time to finish it, so intricate is its structure and so hard to capture with paint. Each leaf is a universe, as complicated as the entire tree. Art cannot hope to replicate or rival nature, Tolkien seems to say, at least not in this world.

Our maple was the beginning from which we slowly claimed the garden as our own, from where we began to learn the art of gardening. Next, we dug out the roses with their tremendously long tap roots and made spaces for our own plantings. We hired men to uproot the monstrous hedge and the mangled metal fence it had engulfed was cut up and removed. In its place a new fence with a wire structure along which to train apple and cherry trees was erected, and much-needed sunlight allowed to drench that side of the garden once again. Finally, we constructed a greenhouse in the brightest corner where we successfully grew tomatoes this summer.

The garden is now our kingdom. I sit in my kitchen as autumn ends and watch as the chill winter wind begins to strip the maple of its leaves and strew them across the lawn in a galaxy of fading embers. As the skeleton of the tree emerges, stark against the grey skies, I think ahead to spring when the tight buds already forming along its spindly arms will burst once more into glorious colour. The tree is constantly renewing itself, a reminder that life cycles on heedless of the past, burning fiercely into the future, whatever changes may come.