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Entwine Alliance
About a sweet birch tilted toward water
trunk bulge spread aslant rock outcrop.
To east,
bulky root weather-toughed, soil-clamped.
To west, root-arm enwrapping the boulder,
plaited in torsion twist
branching to triple root-fingers, their tapered entwine
route-forging through gulleys where
rain leaches nurture from leaf-drift.
About lichen sprawled across granite-pelt
shademottles, leafshadows cooling the boulder.
About a downwind root pocket padded with leaf-mold
sustaining a cluster of Solomon’s seal,
arched stems thrusting toward sunrays
leaf-channels hydrating berries, while
pendulous leaf shadows pantomime breeze
About lifepulse junctions enacted in form:
a tree niched near aquifer
enfolding
a boulder
under shuttling sunlight
in leaf-crafted
atmosphere
on a
looping planet.
The Heart Rate of a Red-Tailed Hawk
on average, 202 beats per minute mine is 65
food, mostly small mammals mine veggie-omnivore
auburn and white feathers pair to my few auburn streaks in white
domicile: twig nest in tree me, house with many windows
through which, I see you in the yard! unusual proximity
perched on a long horizontal
sustained unwavering I become as still as you,
no feather-ruffles
long practice holding a gaze
Is it mere accident you seem to look my way?
Is your stillness just prey-ready?
for me, a prayer to
un-conceal connection
the term “adjacent” insufficient for
this yearning
to tug the thread that tangles us together
neither prey nor protector, no necessity
I’m touched by “wildness,” flight, while
you perhaps find respite with no predators
I ache to claim this gaze is mutual –
does that imply intent?
I honor this space that opens in
elongated gaze
‘til you release the branch to soar,
circling wide
and out of sight
Hard to Know the Whole of it
Every wound ever suffered remains within a tree,
but while they may not heal, most trees do get closure.
—Michael Snyder, Vermont forester
From afar, just a black hole
in an oak, pitch black blanking out
the ambient light
the hollow a token of loss
a left-behind gap,
I wasn’t here, wasn’t cognizant
when the limb tumbled
or was wrenched or sutured off –
can’t put my hand inside
to palpate a wound –
would fear insects, or…
“Trees are quite commonly beat upon,”
rooted in place as they are:
assaulted by chainsaws, windstorms, humans
wanting more sunlight, more asphalt, more…
Trees can’t heal like animals
“The trick is in sealing, not healing.”
Commotion around a wound –
rolls of puffed or ridged callus tissue
narrow in around the injury,
sealing by increments.
In flesh, scar tissue rarely flexes
as well as what was cut.
We recuperate, at best –
climb past the missing rung
while mishaps fold into memory
or stick to the skipped beat.
The tree rings out each season in
cambium cylinders, while in tandem,
wound-work sequesters past afflictions.
Lines of Attunement
A whirr in the air, ruby-throat will be here, slurping from butterfly bush – or there, sucking sweet nectar from clethra, then gone – to the trumpet flower on the entry roof, hovering to sip and flit, mostly dashing between, near-weightless with figure eight wing-flaps.
Visualize the ruby-throated hummingbird in spring retracing magnetic flight-lines, riding tailwinds from Mexico or Panama to New York across the Gulf of Mexico.
Though hordes travel north, each flies alone.
Visualize me, drenched in Ruby reverie, planting deep-lipped flowers for allure. I’m there at the purple dot on the Hudson Highlands map, tucked in between Copper Mine Brook and the ridge where the Appalachian Trail wends northeast out of earshot.
Arriving here year after year, readily finding favorite brights blooming on
seasonal cue, Ruby sips and whizzes by
then lingers in air as if to give thanks,
just at eye level, just out of reach,
and once for so long
I felt love dart,
dropped my concerns as ardor pulsed
while quivering wings held hummer in heart-thrum suspension.
This year no roaming love-bird raced in on southerlies of spring.
I eye the trumpet flower blooms each afternoon.
They’ve been spotted in the neighborhood.
Had plastic feeder lured my familiar away?
Without reciprocal, our shared love-line boomerangs back,
a greeting hand left dangling.
But there! – the bird you barely see, peripheral, then vanished – the flash
that tugs the heart – is surely a hummer. This newbie doesn’t know me,
doesn’t care, except for nourishment, variety of treats –
I settle for adjacency, for now,
an honorable relation, no harm, some help.
I’ll spread my care to all the warm-bloods
and wait, and hope in future years
New Ruby learns my features,
eyes me, face to face.
Meanwhile, magnetic lines persist, aiding
migration waves across continents.
Note: Scientists have established that hummingbirds have facial recognition skills.
Pulse under Water
Perched on the boulder pile, legs dangling
toward the funnel
where the current slows
from flowing brook to log-dammed dip-pool
pellucid to its base
silt settled
last fall’s leaf-drop
forced downstream by recent storm
Skimmers skate the languid swell.
Dragonflies’ toothed jaws snap
insects – their weight-full daily
an occasional toad comments
from clay bank
Stretch leg, edge in, rippling
chill water-skin, ankles bluing.
toad eyes follow without startle
Slip in resistless, halfway under,
weight-drop immerse-under
eardrum muffled timpani
brook-throb
hone inward
From Where, Wind
When the wind is in the east, it’s good for neither man nor beast.
When the wind is in the north, the old folk should not venture forth.
When the wind is in the south, it blows the bait in the fishes’ mouth.
When the wind is in the west, it is of all the winds the best.
— traditional English nursery rhyme
From a dusty right brain file the image flashes:
a black and white drawing of some hoary power
east of the sun and west of my childhood fancies
puffing away to make these winds that thrash branches
cloud-puffs contoured with tapered black brush-strokes
a potent exhale
a magic carpet might alight with ease
to transport one above storm-reckonings …
but I wander
Now we’re grateful to the weatherperson,
intermediary to new science that informs
but cannot save us
Some cultures predict weather from agitation and
migration of animals, and even I can sense
a storm in brew when birds batten down.
If you click your heels, you might restore
the force of faded powers, but you –
mistrusting wizards’ hidden schemes –
clutching your smartphone for security –
will settle for weather channel specialists,
balanced by rambles in the bits of wonder
left off-screen.
Swiveling Eyeballs
They say “build it and they’ll come,” but in human endeavors, so much depends on so much. Sometimes people open cafes and no one comes. They wait, and eventually shutter. A pond, though, is different, even a tiny pond, a 3 x 5 feet enlargement of a spring-fed stream, nicely rock-lined. Make a pond and frogs WILL come. They’ll materialize from the underbrush, as though just waiting for the opportunity. American Bullfrogs, bright green swipe on upper lip, yellow jowl, striped leggings. They stay under the pond surface except for protruding faces, with eyes that seem to follow you. They have that cold-blooded staying power I could never match and bulging eye sockets that allow their eyes to rotate, so they can stay still. I’d have to move my head, at the least, to see 180 degrees. But then, why would I try to hide? Humans are gawky and obvious on two legs, almost everywhere. Frogs, on the other hand, can change their tone to blend with backgrounds in the green to brown range. I often don't sense their nearness to the pond presence until my steps incite them to jump in.
As a child, I modified the fairy tale of a prince bewitched into a frog body: the “frog” was big already, probably child-size, as if costumed for Halloween. And when released from the spell, he stepped out by spreading a cape, the gesture allowing for any needed adjustment in size. Did I think that story was about love, or power, or social inevitability? Should we assume the princess WANTS a prince and will just step into that preordained story and go through the motions until “happily ever after” relieves them of public scrutiny? And why a frog? The least likely to attract, with their literal cold blood? Yet here I am, watching one with fascination.
And the frog seems to be looking my way, as well. I know their eyes are tuned for moving insects. Is the frog eyeing me, or just generally scoping a field, scanning for food, and evaluating my intentions in the periphery? Would there ever be a moment when the frog would take me for granted as an ongoing part of this local ecosystem, or will I always be the intruding hulk?
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