The larch from which souls soar

Larch is first and foremost a nostalgia for a time when gasoline had to be earned. We had to climb. On foot. Up to around 2000 meters, but as a child, that meant all the way to the sky. We were carried along by the walk, caught up in the ascent of our being and our senses, guided by the desire to find those trees whose resin smelled so good and resembled apricot jam. We tasted, but taste always disappoints the sense of smell, that of the larches like that of the bread, warmer, rounder, softer when you smell it than when you put it in your mouth. So we’d spread resin on our brother, who in turn would smear us with it, pin us to the ground among the crunchy but soft needles, and we’d find ourselves half-child half-tree, thorns stuck to our arms and faces. And we hid from our parents, behind the reddish trunks, or on the ground that had become as soft as a trampoline, since larch trees produce a soft humus, as well as being deliciously fragrant.

It was necessary to grow, while larch trees became more widespread, arriving on the plains and in low mountain regions. We had to abandon the sense of smell for a nobler, more adult, less animal sense: sight. Happiness also lies in contemplation. In Derborence, for example, at the end of summer, you can see the metamorphosis from green to golden to orange of this coniferous tree which, unlike the others, sheds its needles every winter, only to produce them again in spring. Like hardwoods, larch follows the cycles of the seasons, the king of adaptation as much as elevation. An elevation that starts at the root. You can’t take off without first putting down roots, or you’ll lose your bearings. Not the larches. Planted as a bulwark against avalanches, rockfalls and erosion, they are one of the main species in mountain protection forests. Firmly anchored by powerful roots, they fix the forest floor, which efficiently absorbs water from rain and snowmelt. Climbing the highest mountains, they seek the light, uniting heaven, earth and the land of the dead. It is the cosmogonic tree for many civilizations, and one of the most sacred in Eastern Siberian mythology, where it is used as a ladder to visit the divine powers.

Among the many larch-related legends, here’s one from Austria. In the ruins of Kienburg Castle, the spirit of a woman wandered restlessly. A passer-by heard him singing sadly. He asked her what was the source of his despair. She replied that she was condemned to eternal wandering to atone for her sins. To the passer-by who offered her help, she explained that, to free her, we’d have to wait until the larch tree growing in the courtyard became big enough to dig a cradle for an unborn child. A few years later, the man returned, cut down the tree, built a cradle and laid his newborn baby in it. The woman’s sad melody became a joyful song, and a streak of light turned into a shooting star in the evening sky. Since then, no one has heard the Kienburg lady cry again.

But the view, we said, and our intuitions that are perhaps just forgotten knowledge: in Combloux, a second-home resident had larch trees planted to hide the view of the cemetery in the small Haut-Savoyard village. Today, it enables tourists to admire this small wood made up of some fifty species, and the dead to join the afterlife thanks to these staircases of souls.