This tweet, posted by the Yasaka Taxi Company in Kyoto, Japan was taken at a Shinto shrine named Tatsumi Shrine. The picture shows a Japanese cherry tree (sakura 桜) with fall leaves. For some reason this really struck me because when people usually think of Japanese cherry trees, they think of cherry blossoms blowing away in the wind, that quintessential symbol of Japanese aesthetic of the impermanence of life (a very Buddhist tenet):
But in fall, even the trees lose their leaves in time. No blossoms, nothing. Just bare trees.
If that doesn’t hit home the message of impermanence, I don’t know what does…. 🖖
Gleanings in Buddha-Fields 