The Ginkgo tree raises its golden yellow standard against an October sky of unblemished blue.The leaves of the lower branches still show plenty of green, chlorophyl leaking from the top downward to reveal the glory that has always swirled within. But above that, my, how perfectly uniform is the color, how brightly it reflects the sun, pure yellow gold purely given to the autumn afternoon.

Two, maybe three weeks from now the tree will shudder from a strong draught of hormonal liqueur, and its fanshaped leaves will fall all at once, almost overnight, not dilly dallying like the oak, or pretending that the air is not growing colder like the pine, but being shed of this whole shedding business with a quick, dignified efficiency, sort of like Aunt Sally did, when, at ninety one, she decided that she had had enough of this old world and she stopped eating and she stopped talking and two, maybe three weeks later she just up and died, probably even surprising herself with the clarity of her passage.

Thomas Jefferson and Henry Clay were right to plant and promote the Ginkgo as a worthy Asian immigrant. Unlike some biological travelers we could mention, this foreigner is well behaved away from home, never shoving aside natives with a superior air. It lives for one purpose: to grow up and out, filling the sky with an unfussy beauty and then suddenly flooding the ground with puddles of stored sunshine once a year.

Robert, the botanist, describes the Ginkgo as an ancient species, and as the most genetically isolated land plant on earth. The last descendant of an otherwise extinct lineage, its closest living relatives may be the conifers, though you couldn’t tell by looking. That’s rather sad; to be so all alone, naturally or not. But it is also a parable of endurance through ages and ages of time.

The Buddhist monks of China knew nothing of this natural history when, for generations, they cultivated and preserved the Ginkgo as a holy tree. Perhaps they were awed by its singularity. One special, all but sacred Ginkgo tree stands as an ensign of grief outgrown by hope in a yard that my wife and I used to own. Eighteen or so years ago it was given to us by plant lovers Mikal and Brian after miscarriage took a baby away. When we see it on return visits, we are reminded of the utter loneliness of that period, but more of the compensatory, healing power of friends who hurt when you hurt.

The lonely Ginkgo is also given compensating grace, in the happiest and the friendliest color in the world: yellow gold sprayed brilliantly across the spotless blue heavens. Who, upon seeing Ginkgo biloba in the fall can fail to be converted from gloom to joy? Who can withhold a smile? Who can repress a a whispered Psalm of praise?