I Live in the World of Breaking Trees

One fell this morning on the fence,

breaking it, too.

Another fell in a storm last year.

In a flash of light

I saw it fall upon the other

and from beneath my cover,

I ran out barefoot in lightning and rain,

wet nightclothes, a woman trying to save the small tree

beneath the broken in its way.

Today all along the roads the bulldozers

push trees over, roots in air, for pastureland.

Trees, let me just say it,

How I love you

and the fireflies that come beneath your leaves,

the moths that hold to you, the bees in the blossoms,

lichens, mosses, the great beauty of Spanish moss hanging,

and nests of feathered down.

I’ve been to a place where among the forest

on Shelter Mountain

stands the woman of compassion.

If we had a statue such as that,

imagine what we’d plant,

what fractures in the world would not exist,

what water would.