Old Trees and Old Poems

I haven’t published in a while. My life has been exhausting.

I continue to try to come to terms with my stage of life and accept it. Part of that means letting things go; recognizing their role, feeling gratitude and releasing.

I found this poem written for a writing exercise: a summing up of a tree’s life in Plymouth MA.

Plymouth Tree

The tree lived hundreds of years on a hill near the ocean,

At first watching native peoples hunt and gather,

and providing shelter to them when they rested, hot or tired,

felt appreciated and grew strong.

The tree witnessed boats arrive in the harbor,

spilling people who built shelters out of other trees,

and was grateful to be spared.

The tree witnessed the native people packing up

and moving on somewhere away from the boat people,

and felt silent sorrow but didn’t stop growing.

The tree witnessed more and more buildings being built

until it could no longer see the beautiful harbor.

Where once its roots anchored in grass and rich soil,

they now struggled to weave underground

beneath bricks and asphalt. Its branches were stunted and cut.

Its oldest roots risen, thick and wrinkled, gray as elephants’ legs,

are observed as a curiosity between two buildings, if noticed at all,

Nature’s history crowded out and imprisoned by progress.

Susan Desrocher