To See a Poem in a Tree

You will need time.

Simple appearance

changes with the light,

weather, and season.

Colors shift; needles,

blossoms, nuts, seed pods

come and go.

Imagine the invisible.

Roots underground

mirror branches above.

Bark shields wood.

Reflect on the gifts:

shade, fuel, food, shelter,

beauty, wonder.

Consider the variety:

baobab, sequoia, palm,

almond, willow, sycamore,

olive, aspen, magnolia.

And here the poem shifts

to topics seemingly unrelated,

the odder the better to baffle

readers: the Byzantine empire

or Galapagos Islands, Cassiopeia,

Cetus, the table of elements, Donald

Duck, China’s Great Wall—all poets

fashion comparisons.

A sly allusion to a famous line adds

a nice touch, as do crunchy verbs,

murmuring metaphors, arcane words.

For an oak or cedar is more than a tree.

And a poem is not a piece of glass

but a wrestling match.

• About
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Pat Tompkins

Pat Tompkins is an editor in northern California. Her poems and shortest fiction have appeared in Channel, Mslexia, Sunlight Press, and other journals.

Latest posts by Pat Tompkins (see all)

• To See a Poem in a Tree - 14th December 2022