I saw a little girl plant a tree
on a beach by a watchful lapping sea;
her mother dug the hole
and by lark I guess covered in the tree.

To their sturdy neighborhood, I then saw them go:
to family, friends, perhaps we may say too
one to a moon-dipped lover, lulling by the shore.

Skip and hop, spin and swirl, laugh aloud, hand-in-hand,
bare-foot princesses dancing through august light.
Whatever cares they share hidden by delight.


I will remain, I think, with the tree.
Soon and carefully I will take it
to a place of loving worms in dark, moist earth,
to dig it a home free of the watching, lapping sea.


© 2016