OPINION (AN COLÚN): Autumn reminds us of our own decline and rebirth

OCTOBER is a time of many weathers. On my walks I can alternate from perspiration in the sun's warm rays to shortly afterwards shivering in a chill breeze beneath a cloudy sky. These shifts in temperature can mean my walks are a routine of taking off my clothing layers and putting on my clothing layers.
Many people will know I love walking in hill areas, but I like walking in any wild place, in any naturally beautiful area. I love walking in woodland.
We are fortunate in Birr to have some very beautiful woodland in our vicinity, including the banks of the Camcor and Little Brosna Rivers, Knockbarron woodland and Orange Hill. The dominant theme of strolling in these areas at this moment in time is the tumbling leaves of Autumn, feet rustling through the mounting leaves, the trees an intense display of reds, yellows and browns.
Autumn reminds us of our own decline and death. For those of us who believe that there is something beyond the material reality, we are sustained by our belief as we walk through the autumnal decline. I recently came across a very nice, short prayer in Irish which nicely encapsulates this sustaining belief: “A Chríost, bí mar fomhar dúinn agus bailigh sinn atá scaipthe; neartaigh dóchas i d'earrach ionainn.” In English this is: “Christ, be our harvest and gather us who are scattered; strengthen hope in your spring.”
One of the poems I have committed to memory is Yeats' beautiful “The Wild Swans at Coole”, the lines of which I often recite to myself as I rustle through the fallen leaves:
“The trees are in their autumn beauty,
The woodland paths are dry,
Under the October twilight the water
Mirrors a still sky;
Upon the brimming water among the stones
Are nine and fifty swans.”
Yeats tells us he has been admiring the swans at Coole for 19 autumns and during that time life has beaten him around quite a bit, emotionally speaking. His heart is “sore”. He feels the experiences of life weighing him down. But the beauty which he reacted to 19 autumns before (the season's colours, the loveliness of the swans) is still there, untrammelled by the ugliness and harshness of society.
In a poem called “Autumn” Patrick Kavanagh talks about making “a pillow of leaves - / Leaves yellow and red / Fallen from trees that are dreams / Imprisoned.” We are not sure who the pillow is for; probably for the poet, but perhaps for a lover. The image of the autumnal leaves reminding the poet of imprisoned dreams is a very fine one. The warm glow of the season, the gentleness of resting our heads in a gathering of leaves, stand in stark contrast to life's frequently prosaic and cold manner. Kavanagh continues, in the third stanza, “Mystical Autumn - fulfilment - / Mother of Bread / Young laughter that carries old age / Vanquished.”
On my most recent woodland walk I was reflecting on an interesting chapter I had just read in an excellent book about the history of the forests of Britain and Ireland. On September the 1st 1919, the Forestry Commission was established in the UK. Its task was to supply timber and provide jobs for demobilised servicemen. Unfortunately, the Commission wasn't guided by an enlightened forestry policy. Instead it was driven by commerce and it pursued a policy of afforestation. Its tree planting programme was dominated by non-native conifers, which dramatically transformed the landscape for the worse in many areas. Where previously the landscape had been covered for millennia by beautiful broadleaf trees, now they were populated with faster-growing conifers. Voices of opposition rose up against the transformation, but they went unheeded. In Wales, critics pointed out that forests were no longer “natural” but were “industrial”. One poet wrote that the conifers' “arrogant roots” were “sucking dry the old soil”. These “arrogant” plantations were dominated by Sitka spruce. Ireland followed a similar pattern, where the new coniferous forests destroyed many rural communities. For example the Slieve Felim Mountains in Tipperary and Limerick were planted with vast swathes of sitka spruce, effectively bringing an industrial mindset to a very scenic upland area. As in many parts of Ireland these Sitka spruce plantations were tightly packed, impossible to walk through and lifeless on the forest floor. The trees were also planted too close to watercourses, which meant many of them fell into the streams.
Throughout the 20th Century this remained the dominant planting policy in both the UK and Ireland. Voices of objection were often raised but were ignored. In the 1970s one critic attacked the policy of planting monotonous forests in straight lines and geometric patterns. He advocated living communities of woodland “throbbing with life.” Few listened. The main focus remained short-rotation forestry based on large-scale mechanical cultivation of Sitka spruce. Nowadays there are only about 200 square kilometres of ancient broadleaved forests surviving in Ireland, having shrunk from covering almost 100% of the island to just 0.2%. When I tramp across the Slieve Blooms I sometimes come across the ancient stumps of these forests which once covered Ireland thousands of years ago (for example on Knocknastumba hill overlooking Glenbarrow). One writer pointed out that Ireland was once a country which was “very largely covered by natural woodland” but then became “virtually denuded of tree cover” and is now a country where a huge majority of the woodlands are “cultivated as a crop” and the practice of forestry is predominantly the practice of tree farming. In the last couple of decades there have been improvements (trees are planted further away from watercourses and more broadleaves are being planted) but the general aesthetic and ecological picture remains poor.

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