Wednesday, April 18, 2007

The Felling of a Tree



So at last it is time.
Beneath me I can feel them.
So tiny, so insignificant
And yet in their hands they hold the power
To destroy
A lifetime of memories.
My branches quiver as they
Shouting their meaningless talk
Shove into my roots
Their sharp needles of pain.
Do they know
Do they care
That they are carelessly
Leveling
All that I contain?
My memories of darkness, under the rich warm soil
Then struggling, a struggle that no man could ever comprehend,
To reach up, out,
Into what I had never seen but wanted?
Then at last, blessed sunshine,
Warm
Full of life
And all I needed to survive.
That feeling of joy
Of that intense exhilaration
Lost.
And more.
I remember seeing children play at my feet
When I was but a sapling.
Their bare feet
Shinnying up my trunk
Fast as any squirrel.
Soft laughter in my branches
Children laughing, children playing
Among my new leaves.
Bouncing, giggling, romping
In a wondrous pile of color
At my feet
When the first breaths of autumn
Chilled the air.
Then they grew up
And went away.
They are dead now,
Long in their graves.
And only my memories remain.
Till these too are taken.
It will not be long now.
I rid myself of all worries
And strive
To remember.
The countless squirrels who made their home here
The sparrows that flitted around my twigs
The insects that bored into my trunk
That tap-tap of the woodpeckers after them
The fire that raged through my forest
But left me intact.
So many memories to see
So little time to see them.
The lightning that struck my neighbor spruce
The hurricane that uprooted half my forest
The war that continued on and on
Within a nation.
The assassination of a great man
Who stopped the war
With his life.
A brave and wonderful woman
Risking her life to win freedom
For so many others.
And more.
The man who had polio but went on to be
A great president.
He came and sat under my branches.
Great artists
Who painted in shapes and vivid colors
All have passed away
Nothing remains but their legacy
And my memories.
These too are being ripped away now.
Below me the men are almost through
With their cruel saws
Their harnesses.
They back away.
One more man still at his job
Till he too, runs back.
A creaking
A groaning
A whistling in my branches
A straining in my roots
Until at last
I fall.





Wednesday, April 4, 2007

Lost


My friend
Bubbling with life
And energy
Sparkling eyes and a quick tongue
Too quick.
Butterfly flitting
For beauty not for use
Laughing or
Crying
Never in between.
Trying yearning
To be what she cannot
Wanting the light
The rush
The glamour
Of the stars
To be older
Than she really is.
Fashion
Lipstick
Jewelry
Smother her
Not realizing
The slow suffocation
Of her inner being.
Only seeing the thin veneer
Never the inside
Of those already lost
In it all.