Found me out in the
Sycamore tree, swaying soft
On an evening breeze

see - cah - moh - re
you used to say that
the wrong ones
dont matter to you, baby-
what if im wrong?
what if i'm not the right one
for you

see - cah - moh - re
you used to say that
the wrong ones
don't matter to you, darling-
but what if you are?
and you're not the right one
for me?

sturdy, sturdy
as the sycamore tree
is my love for you,
my darling thee

but as the roots, spreading
continuously till bedrock-

there is end to us,
there is end to love.

see - cah - moh - re
you say that
the right ones dont matter to you now
for they have no stories
to tell
no regrets to burn

and like the sycamore tree
that you've always pronounce wrong;
till there is growth in stagnation.

I know you're right for me.

Sikorki tchnienie w locie musnęło ziemię,
Kresy, wrzosy, suche liście też na wietrze.
Na sykomorze dalekiej Arabii ustała,
skulonego u jej korzeni tego, co sonety
o Aleppo układał, wysłuchała,
i przeto myślami po raz pierwszy
swe osmolone smogiem skrzydełka przetarła:

"Ku czemu się wykluwałam? Ku czemu latałam?
Swym trelem, uwagi skinieniem, czego mam być wyrażeniem?"
Nagle poczuła w każdej małej kości:
"Odpowiedź jest jedna: Miłości"

Że ma ona twarz wszystkiego, niczego, spojrzenia naszego:
Dwóch samców złączonych łabędzia czarnego,
Smutku dla szczęścia innego znoszonego,
Sekretu czule z łzami deszczowi wyznanego
I drzewa z grzyba korzeniem splątanego.

Że ku temu radość innym daje, że tego jest formą,
Wszystkich uczuć, chwil i wrażeń zmową.

"Dziękuję", na tą myśl światu odpowiedziała,
z wdzięczności dla poety z dołu
korę drzewa pocałowała,
i z nową tęsknotą, ku niebu Syrii,
odleciała.

My misgivings hide among the shadows,
In the tangle of long grass along the hedgerow
Between your wide open fields and my cultivated lawn.

Unspoken truths crowd out the spring bulbs,
Now snarled with weeds and thorned with blackberry,
The cobbled pathway which once linked my hope with your promise.

Will you meet me at the gate by the old sycamore tree?
If yes, then bring your dreams, untethered, and the dappled autumn sunshine,
I will bring my careful notions and the soft spring rain.

Prim roses and wild lilac; a velvet ash and sweet chestnuts,
Your gypsy summer, my redbud winter,
Our season, one garden.

peeling wallpaper
2. unembossed boarskin
3. sunburnt mahogany
4. sequin firewood
5. bible page bark
6. chocolate tendrils
7. exfoliating exoskeleton
8. bleached crimson
9. acid wash chestnut
10. sycamore's elbow

Squeeze gently like lemons and fruits
Sweet nectar juices produced

**** tongue close to core
Butterscotch like tapped sycamore

Perspiration seeps from peel
Porous citrus aromates near

Grown in sun among the wildflowers
Oh how I love her, even when she sours

I like to think I'll find peace for me
resting beneath a sycamore tree.
I can't feel its roots burrow into my body,
sapping me of my strength.
No
    No
No
    No
No
Can't you see?
There is peace beneath this sycamore tree.
Look at how it shelters me
in the shade, so I can't see the sun.
No
    No
No
    No
No
What on earth are you telling me now?
This is just a simple sycamore tree
it is not acting sycophantically.
I'm not held down, it's protecting me.
No
    No
No
    No
No
It wants your death to fertilize its growth.
You're rooted to the sycophantic tree.
Just go, there is nothing here for you.
I'm corrupted, leave without me.

That cold, harsh,
February rain slashes against
the panes of glass in my bedside window.

The sycamore tree in the front yard
with it's thick lashes,
groaning,
rattling,
has chased away the coo of the owl.

I've grown used to it's lullaby
and, as I drift off,
I worry a tired thought:
will he come back?

Day breaks on Doubletop Mountain, shadowing villages below.
Three-thousand eight hundred feet tall, it captures the eye!
And standing at attention there in front of me, a battalion of Sugar Maples in full…. Fall…. Regalia!
Cascading tones of Crimsons, Burgundy, scarlet reds and Golden Hue.

Gazing over Dunk Hill as farmer’s plow  fields, turn again for fertility,
There are only brief streams of life giving sunlight, and now the sky turns to a pale grey.
Me, well I live for this time of year….enjoying the evening autumn constellations,
Or Moms dining table adorned with Indian corn and blackberry canes!

Bessie's Margaretville home begins the fall ritual of canning and drying.
Breaking out winter clothes…as she proclaims "no whites after Labor Day"!
The last bit of warmth now dwells just behind the Catskill’s Harvest Moon,
And the V of geese honk their good-byes to the summer sun.