As a young girl in loveShe’d walk through the woods to her tree.
It lay flat on the ground
Bark pulling away from the trunk
Rain and rootlessness
Changing it slowly to a charcoal gray.
She’d hike back to it
Looking up at the morning sky
Perhaps pining for some new boy
Or luxuriating in fresh moments of young love.
She’d dream of futures
Watching the clouds billow and flow
An armada of hopefulness
Sailing across the deep blue expanse above.
She’d feel her tree before she’d even see it
The racing of her pounding young heart
Giving its presence away
Once there she’d sit
Admiring her previous handiwork
A litany of dreams and plans
Realized and dashed possibilities
Represented by the names
Etched in to the wood in front of her.
She tells her youngest daughter
That someday
She will find a tree of her own.
Now, over thirty-five years on
She returns
A new name beating beneath her breast
A ripe and spinning unknown
Laying itself out before her
Surprising
Needed
Teetering on the brink of realization
And she dreams again
That once that name is carved into her log
This new start, this speeding heart
This electric fuzziness she can’t shake
Will manifest before her
A dream made real
A soul tied to her own.
The penknife shakes imperceptibly
With the anticipation of the first
Slow, loving cut.
~ for Cami, June 26, Arden
