The braches of the faint oak were bewitched to a dark gold under
the orange, thick silk sunset. 
The wood, as the sun lowered, changed from apple green
to golden billow
which swept foamy,
rose clouds along a now cucumber, blurry horizon.
Plump plums and fruit rinds
litter ripe walkways alongside the flower beds who's tickled buds
are closing slightly as the fickle sky, gone nine, turns to a majestic
Indian blue and the June monastery's milky swirls are lit by the sugar lump stars.

I remember creeping reverently past
The yawning maw
Snarling braches, overgrown foliage
Sad eye sockets
The defeated roof
Listing drunkenly to the left
The black spirals on the ground
Where the fire had scored earth bare
Crouched from the sanctity of the sidewalk
Damp palm snaking back to
Clasp tight
My best friend’s hand

Fear skittering up our spines
We skirted past poisonous green weeds
That swayed in the yard
Unkempt and our eyes
Darted, seeking, feral
For movement in that open doorway
Her shadow
The witch

Years pass

Looking out into suburbia
Manicured green boxes
And cookie-cutter plans
From my own cracked window
My newly acquired reno,
I spot a flash of moving colour
From beyond the overgrown hyacinths
A tousled flash of curls between the green
Puzzlement ripples as
Three lanky preadolescent forms
Snake from the protection of my shaggy firs
Thin chests taking a breath before
Their whippy arms point accusing
And I barely see a flash before
The clutched rock leaves the
Stupid-looking red headed one’s hand
Crashing through my upstairs master

And I hear it

Witch, witch, where’s the witch?

And I feel it.

My eyes beadily narrow
Peering over my bulbous nose
Shoulders hunching
Toes curl
And I reach for
The broom leaning next
The painter’s cloth
Grabbing on with knobbly fingers
Hurling myself
Out
Of
The door

Their eyes widened
Disbelieving
As they spot me  
And thumbs clutched between index fingers
They run
Leaving me cackling
Breathless

While my familiar
Looks up from
Sunning her black self
On the step.

Timelessly, limitlessly the braches soard to the sky,
Tirelessly, fatiguely the roots hit the core of earth,
From cerrulean heights to crimson dark depths,
Lied the distance between self and wisdom of heart,
Not sure if it is loftiness or suicidal thoughts of death,
Not sure if it is a revolutionary act of anarchy,
Or just a free spirit, free rebelious depart.
ACT OF KISS
Lost, in knowing self, lost between the crowds,
Lost in my own thoughts, lost in my own mind,
Lost, a loner, I had been, thou I had seekth,
In the deepest roots of my heart,
In the most complex dark corners of myself.

It started with a tree,
And when I climbed,
Nothing could stop me.
High and higher,
I went.
But the braches got
Thinner and thinner.
Until one finally snapped.
And I fell from my safety,
Right into the mouths of wolves.

If a tree fell in the woods and spoke to me – I wonder if the words will mimic the ones printed in the books it turns into,
or if the wisdom will be reminiscent of its number of rings,
I lost count at 23 –
The age you were when you wanted to tie the other end of the rope around the braches,
you saw them reaching out to the sky,
a serendipitous commonplace in your eyes,
well I’m thankful that the tree came down with the storm and that you found your footing among the leaves.
                              
                                               Believe me when I say --
That I never meant to tell you to speak out of my own need to make my life better than it should be,
I just wanted to make it okay--
To let you tell the truth instead of telling only what you thought you wanted me to hear you say.
                                                  You were afraid --
That the thoughts in your head and the rings in your trees made you unfit for this world,
and that the city’s ambience would always drown out the gusts of wind at the shores of Walden.
That no distance to run would take you far enough away to find ears to hear of your suffering,
I promise that I’ve never been more pleased to say you’re wrong.

The branches full of white like
snow flakes in status, frozen
on the braches flowing in
the breeze.

Then like angel feathers they
glide upon the wind like a snow
flake each different each gentle
blossom travels on the breeze .

Like a blizzard they caress my
face, softly touching cold, but
more gentle than a snow flake.
The beauty of a blossom on the
trees.

Then as though picked they flow
like a blizzard of beauty white and
pinks float around gentle petals
travelling upon the gentle winds.

Spring came early
Abundant warmth and rain
Roots thrived, blossoms galore
Leaves burst forth hoping to gain
All the sunshine and happiness
Partaking without restrain

Summer was gentle
Temperatures milder
Giving the braches and leaves
Room to grow wilder
Seeking to fill the sky
Providing shade so much kinder

Autumn approached so gradual
Leaves dancing in a shimmer
Offering all a grand display
Before they fall and wither
Endless blessings received
Every color offering a glimmer

Winter always ahead
Leaves will endow
A surface upon which
Thick ice forms on the bough
Too many leaves, too much weight
Massive destruction now.

If spring had been dry, autumn
Arrived sooner or summer hot
Leaves would have been fewer
The ice would not
Have shattered all the branches
Though valiantly they fought!

I looked up, at the snow-draped pine boughs
As I stood in the branches of a tree that no one owns
A tree that rises between two fences,
That as I child, I never once climbed
But today, an almost-adult, I finally did

I looked up, from underneath the heat of my winter hood
As I packed snow onto the stairs and set my tube at the top
As a child, I never would have dared this feat
What with icy water so close by
But today, I calculate my risk and then my snow tube and I
Set off to fly

I looked up, from the depths of the snow
Cradled by an angel of my own making
The world lowered to background noise
I watched thin brown braches thrash and bow in the wind
And I wondered at how different I am from childhood me

How I could live so vividly now
Yet not feel happy

I smile, crinkling the frost-bitten skin around my eyes
And let my thoughts fall away like drifting snowflakes
For a moment in time, restoring my heart to a purity that only exists
In the first seconds after a snow storm

Tainted innocence no more.

Suffering is an art form

Like everything I have ever done
I have mastered it

The slow murmur of movement
Dogged by depression

The hummingbird’s frantic song
Of anxiety

The drifting of days marked only
By the ticking of a broken watch

I am war
And famine
And disease

For as long as I have breathed air
It has been poisonous

A toxic oxygen

I have learnt the art of dying
Without death

The finality of it never quite succeeding
The motion of my desire for it

I want to purge my body of the filth
That has been inflicted on it

Trauma that seems impossible to carry
On my shoulders

I am a tree grown from a bitter root
Planted into the ground as an afterthought

My braches twisted, leaves that will never know
The brilliant colours of autumn

But I stand, still
Weathered and beaten and broken

Still, I stand

Skiff and Skaff the bleak  stitch has a sum of the all grey that surrounds

Under undulations and foibles from the skies lands the ground

Inside scatters of polished brandished leather the undertones panders  escape & the land


Yuletide, resonance of spring, flowers blusters and storms, wicken,  lightening and rains that sing

All of this can be found, strength of the tales tall, trunks affirming, braches exfoliate, solid girth from the earth's own

Enduring

Together with nature, all and I, if even a grey sky
Find the bark of all creations blunt - accessional not frail
Nor shy, nor the less...  of the spirit in you and I!