The Battle Of The Trees
The seaside pine
in the late afternoon
its sticky liquor
in my hand
I am of the dark entanglements
of the forest oak
that is heartbreakingly
positive
like the end of a long book
when the lights are out
a dense forest of birdcalls
that encircles the house
I am in the middle of that
too, and the sword
of the evening star
separates us
from the treetops
*
All along the estuary
they grow into the airway
confidence moves through them
through their roots
from the silt and the clams
the trees are brandishing
their swords
they have no secrets
from the grasses
they grow among the yarrow
illiterate and passive
beautiful
striking down their foes
in a dream
through the heavens with me
moving too, and sometimes
falling, blind, a great love
for everything wrapped
in wrens – not thinking
of the secret identity
of the king or the magic
in the clouds stretching
in the distance
books that say otherwise
remain on the shelves.
*
I remain in my tent while
the hemlocks are locked in combat
above me
and read translations
from an alphabet of branches
the book
has a weight in my hand
all out of proportion
which unnerves me
the solid whap
of the poplars across the river
I come back to them
along a faded wooden causeway
under a peignoir of stars
I see only the breakers
spreading across the bay
I am not afraid to stand
beneath the elms
and say whatever I can
to them, because they have
been mortally wounded
*
Despite the constant
ministrations of the box elder
I was sunburned
through my shirt
and lie now
in the air-conditioned room
too full of books
to maneuver myself
into the painting
that is still energy
I have worshipped trees
from rooftops
and beneath them
the way they dominate
the city
in books and with books
which are made of trees
that is what they have
been trying to tell us
all along
while satellites
cross themselves
over the bay
the stars are too drunk
to see in our windows
the hawthorne reaches
through the wind
to find us on the floor
*
In a deathly roar
the crowns of the oaks
shattered and rained down
in the rain and terrible
musketry of huge hailstones
blasting the tamarack
extinguishing the campfire
filling the forest floor
with ice cold moonlight
from which we retreated
under our rain fly
onto the picnic table
the voice of the storm
sang the terrible notes
of the opening movement
of the power of the stars
to fall on us
and only the hemlock’s
upraised poniards
stood ready at our defense
while I was like a blade
of grass
From Mars
We have some sad news
this morning
from Mars
the imagination thinks
in phrases but the universe
is a long sentence
according to our instruments
the oldest songs are
breaking apart
like a puzzle in a
basement every so often
we detect the smell
of marshmallows where
there are none the end
cannot be found
in the middle that’s
a dream someone had
that our lives might
have meaning and not
just pop-up advertisements
but we have sad
news this morning
the dream has no
location or direction
and friends separated
by thousands of miles
are thinking of each
other simultaneously
but they have no idea
and we have no way
to reach them
