The Calm of Dawn

No panic
Just the first golden glisten
Of dawn
On the autumn leaves.

No racing heartbeat
Just the wet dew of grass
The tiny frog
Watching from the leaf pile

No fear
Just the rustle
Of bird, of breeze
In the thinning treetops

If I could bottle this
Could link myself to the trees
All day
The stress would never
Overwhelm me
Again.

Step Back

Put down the list of things to do

Save it

For a moment when your jaw

Isn't clenched

When the words

Don't blear together

From the throbbing behind your eyes

The floor needs sweeping

So put on some soft socks

To mask the feeling

Tuck the dishes into the sink

And cover them with a towel

The laundry can wait until tomorrow

Now is not the time for stress

Your brain can't handle much more

Without committing suicide

So let go...

Open the shutters wide

And soften your eyes with the green of trees

Drift along with the music

Of the turning of the earth

Feel it rumble under your toes

And echo with your own heart beat

God didn't create while panicked

He made it all slowly

Step by step

Looking over each little plant

To say,

Yes, that is good.

Trees

[Note: For the next few posts--or however long it takes me to come down from my manic high--I'm going to be posting all about the stuff I LOVE... and if you prefer depressing, angst-ridden posts by me, you'll need to scroll down a few days (I have plenty of them to spare, I'm afraid). I'm too happy to be sad right now.]

I THINK that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree. -"Trees," by Joyce Kilmer

I won't quote the rest, mainly because the poem isn't really that good (but also because this is my blog, not Joyce Kilmer's). But I share Kilmer's sentiment, for I like pretty much nothing as supremely as trees. Why do you think I moved to Seattle? For the rain? Come on!

I have lived in many relatively treeless places in the past--Las Vegas, Kansas, Oklahoma, central Illinois (cornfields for as far as the eye can see)--and it wasn't fun. In the heat, the sun beats down without a break. In the winter, all I can see is gray. My soul dries out during the winter, crackling like the deciduous trees after an ice storm.

I know a lot of people love flowers--but my nose is sensitive, and I've found over the years that I react to many flowers. Easter lilies will drive me out of a church just so that my throat doesn't close up. Even now, walking through a spring-ish, flowering world, I find that my eyes water from the heady smell.

But remember that evergreen scent from a real Christmas tree? Heavenly. A divine mixture of earth, magic, and the color green.

Can you hear the rustle of the trees when the wind blows gently through them? Even in your mind, I know you can. Close your eyes and wait, and the same wind, touched with the warm green of the trees, will reach you. Julius Lester's novel Cupid suggests that if you stop and listen, you'll hear the message the trees are telling you, for the sound is their whispering, and only the true believer can understand it.

If you can, seek out the quaking aspen, my favorite tree EVER. It's from the poplar family, but is far smaller and more delicate than its cousin the cottonwood... Its leaves look like coins, green on one side, silver on the other, and when the wind blows through them, the whole tree shimmers like magic.

Check it out: Aspen Video

So, what are your favorite trees?