GROVE

                                       In Print

                                                 Hoof prints framed in white.

                                                     Deer came by this way.

                                                 So did snow, a trace of it

                                                     Sun will melt today.

                                                 Hoof prints framed in white.

                                                     Deer came by today.

                                                 So did snow, a trace of it.

                                                     White paths melt away.

                                                     Growth Ring

                                The difference between a line

                                                    And line is annual.

                                                Across the forest every tree alive

                                                    Expands the scene.

                                                Some quell into snags or break

                                                    But all the rest rely

                                                Upon infrequent storms to make

                                                    A panoply of green.

                                                   Sentinel Pine

                                           1

                                                        Sentinel pine,

                                                        May there be vanilla

                                                        In all I do:

                                                        Through bark

                                                        My heart beat

                                                        Sensing you.

                                           2

                                                        Sentinel pine,

                                                        Your yard arms so lateral

                                                        Catch the winds for me.

                                                        Let the photons build the cells

                                                        That needle from your boughs.

                                                        Waft, and grow above the roots

                                                        That anchor life, for now.

                                                                3

                                                         Sentinel pine,

                                                         Risen as a rapt design,

                                                         Intercepting every breeze

                                                         By undulating melodies,

                                                         Rooted in the scene.

                                                                4 

                                                        Sentinel pine

                                                        The air is your shrine,

                                                        All you divine

                                                        Through it.

                                                        Electrical charge

                                                        Or arid interims,

                                                        Between the rains

                                                        You rivulet.     

                                                        Yucca Pine 

                                                                    1

                                                        Yucca pine, yucca pine,

                                                         I stab my shin by you.

                                                        Shelves of bark just drop away –

                                                        A seed the star’s light grew.

                                              2

                                                       Yucca pine, yucca pine,

                                                       Around your toes, a flush of spine.

                                                       Herald of the winds, your sigh,

                                                       A measure of the moving sky.

                                                                     3

                                     Yucca pine, yucca pine,

                                                       You’re so alive, so unsuppine!

                                                        Prayer Pine

                                             Frail Prayer pine, lightning’s gashed your side,

                                                 Making it more vulnerable to be.

                                             Bark should be the cover for a wound so wide,

                                                 The vertical interior I see.

                                             Still, you make dimensional

                                                 This land that I love;

                                             Rooted in your being, you

                                                 Portray force from above.

                                             Momentary might can last a lifetime

                                                 As a trace,

                                             Interfacing thunder with the thoughts

                                                I here embrace.

                                                 Pinon Deva

                                                             1

                                           Pinons down along the path

                                               Cannot rise again.

                                           They become a broken swath

                                               To haunt the hiking men.

                                           Ancestors with us in mind

                                               Made this path ago,

                                           Thinking all along, the forest

                                               Lush, would always grow.

                                           They did not anticipate machines

                                               Would make us sit

                                           And watch as gases filled the sky:

                                               Trees killed, because of it.

                                                                2

                                              They’re falling in the trails, now,

                                                  Of the land they blessed.

                                              Pinon pines reflect the state

                                                  Of man under arrest.

                                                      Redwoods

                                                 Dorothy wept for redwoods

                                                     Though they, above it all,

                                                 Cultivated wisdom of the ages

                                                     For their fall.

                                                 Luna’s nest was empty

                                                     Before the saw bit through.

                                                Wood as old as Abraham

                                                     From starting seedlings grew.

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