bare before autumn

such was my condition, in the wantonness and selfishness of my existance, that before i had the light, i loved the darkness. i wore it like a body suit, loved the way it touched my skin, feeling cold yet not without comfort.
and in this selfish place where all that mattered was i, i used to collect leaves.
not the pretty dead litter of fall, but green leaves, fresh, plucked from whichever tree i became enamoured with in the moment, the one upon which my eyes and the sun fell equally, revealing to me a beauty i didn't understand, couldn't understand, but knew only that i had to hold, even though the holding was itself an act of terror on the light. the leaf, in my hand, would soon die, would certainly shrivel within a day or two of being on my shelf, and, ugly now and cracking and old, i would discard it in favor of another beautiful living thing, the cycle beginning again, the results just as inevitable.
this active defiance of the light and the beauty excited me, so much so that even now, with light within me, i still sometimes glance at trees and recall the feeling, crave that simple rush, imagine, with some level of desire i wish i could simply expunge, my hand plucking a leaf, my fingers tracing it's veins. like a drop of food coloring kneaded into bread dough, the whole is now discolored, even though the taste can be something healthy once one gets past the appearance.
that was once the dillema... the appearance versus what is really there, vision versus substance.
but no longer.
for now a new question plagues me, a new season brings a new light.

i met someone, recently, who once had many leaves, and many leaves stolen. out of season, bereft of green protection, bare before the autumn. it breaks my heart to picture her this way. it breaks it further to know that once, i would not have cared, would have contributed to the defoliage, would have owned, for a little while, a room full of greenery that did not belong to me, decorating my life for a while with stolen vitality that would soon ruin under my shadow.
but now, i am ready to accept leaves as they fall... knowing that, in season, collecting leaves is beautiful, a harvest of beauty laid at one's feet, the perfection of fall, undoing my savagery in it's bright colors of passing.
but what on earth do i say of the feeling that still lingers, of the way i can occasionally see a tree in full green and feel that familiar twinge, that slight tremor of residual addiction to death, to the things that i no longer want, but still sometimes crave? how will she not hate my thoughts, despite their lack of intent? i care, perhaps more than i should at this point, and am afraid, for the leaves, for the beauty, for greenery that i will not touch and for autumn hues that i have hope of one day seeing in all their splendor.
i'm sorry, beyond words, beyond even the shape of words in imagined worlds, beyond the shape of a mouth struggling to form a thought into something understood and failing, sorry for all the ways that i am still what i was, that this red stain seems so permanant. i loathe that the color of my crust will have such potential for hatred and for fear and for shadows that make me feel old and lost.
please, please, forgive me, everyone.

there is always the chance i will still fail. but there is also always the chance of success. this is the fork in the road, these are the paths, taken and not, that shape hope and life. if i meet you somewhere on this road, and you know better than i which direction in which to step, please offer me advice, and i will do the same, and perhaps we will continue together on the road, or meet again further on where the paths converge again, and then, we will be well-met, and hug each other as family, and live in love without fear.