A Silver Birch

Hand upon bark, braille

in scars of lenticels;

a papered chronicle 

of dark fissures I cannot read - 

a silver birch will keep its secrets.

 

Beyond the uniformity 

of a ploughed field,

beyond the words 

of the long grass,

beyond the empty ring

of a church bell;

no distant god will save me now,

though here, remain wounds

of initials, faded, of a story of innocence

that I no longer remember.

 

I can only recall the tangle

and broom, the orange underwing

of a moth, and other men 

of greater sins. Once,

a birch might be dressed 

in women's clothes, ceremonially,

rubies of fly agaric at her feet:

a network to feed a tree, and by return,

be sweetened by her roots.

 

Not all relationships are so reciprocal,

I have forgotten as much as I am able, 

but still my skin bristles. 

Do not spare the rod,

he said,

men have always ruled the world,

he said.

 

A silver birch is whitened

with betulin - to shield itself

from the scald of sun; and

they grow up fast, these trees,

to survive alone, sprout 

slender branches that can bend

to the will of another: 

this is how you fight

to hold on to what light is left.

 
Image is from here: https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Tom_Thomson_Silver_Birches.jpg

 

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