I imagine trees
I don’t pretend to know
the language of our forests
the canopy of pronouns they use for each other
I cannot read between their assiduous trunks
…………………what do I know of their crowned nouns
for water, air, soil, earth and us
…………………or of foliaceous adjectives describing
their shifting hunger and thirst, their sudden cuts and blows.
I know how they make me feel
sane
soothed
sure of life
in my home supine tree pose
pursuing the tree of life once spoken about
…………………it is You
a breathing greenth
gigantic gigatons
greeting me graciously
interlaced in an oxygenated affair
of hydroponic veins and roots
storing yesterday’s happiness.
In my stuttering transpiration
I imagine how to be a soft offspring
toughening up leaves to survive
with the precision of a drop
of water
sliding
upwardly
through throaty thin passages
threading out finely and slowly
stretching out to the nouns and adjectives
the whole forest bequeaths best
if it were not the valley of dead trees
mourning the streaming sapience.
I hear what remains
of their bordered elders
ring and echo around me
that earth is not theoretical
nor a symbolic trade of life
urging me to learn their tree-wise words
so we all ripen into the trees of knowledge
they deserve to eat, drink and breathe from us.
© Caterina Mastroianni. All rights reserved
