Poem: (Obscurity)

Walking this morning to the wishing well,

Now that the rains have come,

Amal Amal is flowing.

The ducks have returned,

As have I,

Though I was there too

When it was dry as stone, dirt and bone.

Running dry.

A man on the corner,

talks to himself, keeping his own company.

Do you have a place to stay? Food?

Me in my pajamas, though you might not know,

slippers wet with dew,

Empty pockets

Heart full of prayers.

He under the bridge,

with others camped along the stream.

The bees have once again occupied the old sycamore trees.

A woman runs to her car, “I forgot my badge,” she says,

I imagine she works at the hospital around the corner.

Running, running.

Two men in masks, one of floral fabric, made by hands,

exit their construction vehicle.

We greet each other with our eyes.

I walk home,

On empty and quiet streets,

Full of our shared predicament -

picking flowers along the way, from the overgrown yards of my neighbors.

Just as I have always done.

Though as a small child,

my parents had me return each blossom, one by one,

to teach me, I presume,

about not taking without asking.

Who owns the flowers?

I wonder.

And the street corner,

and under the bridge,

and the sycamore trees - leaves soft like the tiny hands of some distant relative, whispered on the wind?

If I Were A Tree

If I were a poet, you would find your way to me through my wild love of rivers,

the way water finds its way to the ocean and the low points of a place; sometimes meandering and sometimes with a purposeful force downstream.

You would marvel at the gentle way the light is reflected off the pine needles of the fir, cedar and hemlock this afternoon. Or is it the way the leaves themselves emanate light in their holy communion with the sun?

I could not help but make you fall in love with Madrone, painting your imagination with the soft ruddy skin of those majestic beings.

We would sit quietly under their canopy, our bare feet on the dry earth, and watch the dragonflies skim over the still face of the nearby pond.

And what about the meadow? I am in love with meadows. The variety of flowers just blooming their way to seed. Yarrow, Goldenrod, Lilies - purple, yellow, white. The openness of a meadow, trusting, bare and available, just there, at the edge of forest, bird song, and mystery. Not simply absence of trees. Meadow invites. In a language I have known since I was small and know now still when I am alone to court the wild soul of things. 

I am in love with trees. I have been since the beginning. How can we not be? In my first remembered dream I am in the branches of a very large tree, around me are all of the other animals in creation. All colors, creatures, textures - tails and talons, wings and scales, claws and tongues, fins, teeth, feathers. The tree is spinning, or rather, we are spinning, around, in and with the tree, as the tree, as, and at the center of, the world. The tree of life.

If I were a tree, you would know the tender wound in your own soul that leads some to violence and others to despair, and others still to magnificent beauty and creativity. You would know the fierce love that defends and protects. You would feel the fur of your skin quiver as you sense the lion approach the meadow, and the clench of your jaw as you pounce.

If I could, I would introduce you to Manzanita, Oak, Cottonwood, Alder, Sycamore, Cedar, Pine. Hone my voice, and raise my voice, and sing a love song of mourning for the trees. A poet’s song, like the mockingbirds, who sing their most beautiful song just as they utter their last breath.

This summer I witnessed mountainsides of dead trees. In Colorado - Blue spruce, Englemann spruce, Douglas fir. In Washington - Broad leaf Maple, Whitebark Pine, Western Redcedars, Western hemlocks, Douglas fir. In California, they are burning now. The trees are burning. The world is on fire. Drought and flames, blight and climate change. 150 million trees dead in California alone over the last years of drought, 18 million just last year, and as we breathe, their breathe, they are falling now, too many to count. Honoring the fallen. 

If I were a poet, I would weave a tapestry of words to give us courage to stand strong and proud as trees, knowing why we are here and what we need to do, strengthen our voices to praise and defend all life, help us carry our dreams home, bring us to safely to shore, belong us to this world, fill our plates with plenty, cleanse our waters pure, ease our bones, protect our children, tend our seeds, ignite our imagination, open our ears to the music, celebrate the beauty of all the tones of our skin, speak to you in the language of your ancestors, remember us to who we are, honor the gifts, practice wild and unabashed kindness, make us fall in love with each other, all of us, rest in the spaces between, hold you close to my heart, turn this world around and around in a sacred rhythm of we. 

Oh my dear friend, if I were a poet, you would never ever feel alone again, nor harm another living being, including yourself. You would fall to your knees for the beauty, and the horror of it all, in a merciful embrace. You would weep for the utter madness and perfection. And then you would rise, you would rise, in full splendor, to love this world with everything you've got, and give it all away. 

I am a tree, come rest in my shade. Come rest in my shade, there is work to be done.