I once grew a garden.
It withered and faded,
Everything except for the tree.
That sapling I couldn't pull from the ground.
It's roots, mottled, protruding from the earths surface.
It's branches bare:
Weathering another winter, alone.
With a sun that couldn't reach.
It's trunk was wide, and filled with holes.
I drilled them there to find its' true age.
For although I planted it there, just a few years ago,
It appeared to be there for ages,
Solemnly resting in the arid soil.
It was no longer my own.
Someone else tended to the matters of its health.
They nurtured it, they fed it, they pruned its' leaves.
But they couldn't hear the songs it made.
Among the branches, among the leaves,
along the trunk, and through the roots.
The markings left from long summer months.
I climbed and climbed,
but always fell back down.
How could it be mine? This tree?
I could not claim it as my own,
I could not feed it,
I could not climb it.
But,
I wanted it.
We made an oath:
I promised always to return to its plot to rest.
And it promised me,
A night that would never end.
I cut my wrist, and fed it my blood.
It's roots responded in turn,
Burgundy wine that dyed its soil.
Now we are like family.
It grows in me,
and I in it.
Now when you see me,
Know that you can hear this trees song.
It taught it to me, through many long nights.
We sing it the same.
So catch me in the meadows' grass,
Under a cloudy day,
Singing madly,
Heading the reapers call.
