He was a Redwood tree in California, born and raised in Missouri and chopped down Virginia. His spirit was oaky strong and wrought with the wisdom of ancient bark, but dead four years shy of fifty. That was my father.
But a tree fell today. A tree whose roots were rocked to their core with hit after hit.
He raged while I danced around the trunk of the father I remembered. Hoping, praying that maybe the impact of little feet on soft ground could rock a forest back into rhythms of strength.
Feet do not make roots grow deeper. Feet tear roots up.
I found him curled up and crying in the closet. I should’ve looked for him sooner.
So let me answer the riddle: the answer is yes.
When a tree falls in the forest, and no one is around to hear it I assure you
it makes a sound.
And when they ask me what my greatest regret was, when I am older than he ever lived to live, I will tell them that I was not with him when he died.
I will tear into bottom lip like roots tear dry ground and tell them that I was branch of his branch and vine of his vine, but I do not know what he wished to say to me in the last moments this earth afforded him.