A Sky Full of Intangibles

Photograph by Reka Jellema.

1.
A sky full
of intangibles
The veins of our leaves
grew trees
River planted, skyward flung
Suppose we weep or shiver
every extremity
crescendos into fugue

2.
Raking
the wind
scooping wrens
into nests
our trunks bellowed
elephant knees,
elbows, we shuffled
gaudy with red
and yellow

3.
As we allow
the shadow`s play on skin
let`s rest awhile, my love
beneath a leafy aspect
Spreading blankets
let the soft caress
run over us
As unfelt touch
As language we`ve yet
to decipher

4.
Ever more
than bough or bark
Roughed up, prickled
Bearing fruit and seed,
sticky with pine sap
aloof or bowed
We are the leaves
dependent
on the stem
Connections break
A slip, a grounding,
We are ever more
than our discardings

5.
Oh the glorious arching
Monet`s finery
undressed
Limbs stretched
in forward bend
Driving cars
beneath a slender grace
Fingers meet above
their heads
Light falling as rain

6.
A stand of trees
Roots ingrained
in sandy soil
Sustained and sturdied
by ten thousand particles
Becoming one
with debris decomposing

7.
Bits of bone
the lesser relics
of these urchins
once Arboreous, we are host
who live in thee
and sup upon
thy sap and stroke
the slippery green

8.
And in our rings
a wisdom and a history
Stories wrought
That tell of fire, drought
Of chilling winds
Of hindered growth
Lines concentric
As the rhythm of a season
Eulogies for all who care
to read them

9.
Twining ivy wends
a thinning crown
The rusted claws
burrow ever deep, upon
the mass of us
Pollards, cankers
pruning cavities
Our bodies pucker
hedging toward
conformity

10.
needles skitter
scatter soft
a knitted throw
of forest floor
and moss
Hither, yon
hardwood knock-
kneed over-toppled
A tired majesty
at rest upon
a quiet quilt
Step lightly round
the fallen

11.
Battened planks -
brothers from another life,
embedded nails in flesh
The rooms they built
The blossom plucked,
arranged in honey jars
Gazing down
on lives arrayed
in verdant expectation

12.
Do this for me
Do nothing here
but be
breathe
I reach and reach
Still
all who enter, 
you shall not come
closer to the truth
than now
Stilled by us
En masse

By Reka Jellema and Kathryn Ross
Copyright Reka Jellema and Kathryn Ross
September 2014

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