The Gentle Beauty....

 The gentle beauty of the sheoak trees always draw me to them when I see them, they have such a softness and grace about them, when the wind moves through their branches they make a soft singing sound, I love this about them the most and am looking forward to the one I have in the garden being big enough to bring it's song to my own garden, mine is still so small, yet everyday when I am out in the garden I always touch her/him as I walk past, I am still uncertain as to what sex my sheoak is.

The sheoak is also known as a casuarina because their branchlets look rather similar to a cassowary feather. They have separate male and female plants and the males release a pollen to fertilise the female, the pollen turns the male trees a dusty red, until that perfect moment when with the help of the wind it is released.

I have sat and watched this amazing pollen release when suddenly the air is filled with spores. It was something I had heard about but never seen personally until last year, the perfect moment for the release was reached, a silent miracle of  life unfolded before my eyes as a huge cloud of pollen drifted before me.
I recall being stopped in awe as I watched and thinking how we miss these spectacular events as human societies move away from nature as technology breeds a new disconnected kind of human.

Life in all forms has so much to teach us, and I know that I am forever learning more about the glorious natural world that surrounds me, and humbled by the strength our beautiful planet has to continue to recreate herself with all the destruction and disrespect she endures at the hands of humanity.

I am constantly amazed at the wonderful silent secrets of nature, how the dance of creation occurs around us endlessly, the extraordinary beauty of creation endlessly recreating itself for us to share if only we stop long enough to see......