They stand for now as wooden cylinders,
bundles of papery straws encased
in sweet green tubes and held by silver strands
ringed with cork and coated in rough tweed,
solid fountains with their leaves splashed out
against their patch of sky, or droplets on the air.
The universe goes on around a tree.
The endless grubby roaring from the fast lane
goes on over their heads. They do not wait.
Trees never touch each other
unless by accident and dislike hands
and exoskeletons, metals, nettles, ropes
and ivy with its twining. Light, rain,
the space to stretch and send out seeds
this is their domain; trees live in symbiosis with
the birds that are their voice, and with the sky.
Now looking past what’s possible to see, up,
walking amongst these trees, their branches
scattered like hopes, the twigs a patterned clutter,
in a realm of circles, lines and silences,
in the strength of the wooden world,
the river of traffic is evidently over,
diminishing; its futile quest fell through.
Stand still and join the company of trees.
Lyn 