First Day Back
Sugar Maple
warm in the sun under my hand.
Smooth,
blistered,
algae on it's bark
the color of beryl.
A startlement
of snake under a quaking aspen,
warming,
knotted
around dewberry bramble,
gold speckled in an acorn cap.
The little curve
over a rise thick with low shrubs
in June,
but here
in April,
all skin and bones!
Laughing
at their nakedness I run past
trailing
my palm
over gold curls
on the big yellow birch.
I ran right past Sam's Dell,
around the tree
and under the bobcat branch
and up to the grasses
and came to a dead stop
wondering how I'd got so far
and how much I'd missed.
I turned around to find
I was standing
under the last pagoda tree
on the path.
Thank you,
I said,
for bringing me back.
Sugar Maple
warm in the sun under my hand.
Smooth,
blistered,
algae on it's bark
the color of beryl.
A startlement
of snake under a quaking aspen,
warming,
knotted
around dewberry bramble,
gold speckled in an acorn cap.
The little curve
over a rise thick with low shrubs
in June,
but here
in April,
all skin and bones!
Laughing
at their nakedness I run past
trailing
my palm
over gold curls
on the big yellow birch.
I ran right past Sam's Dell,
around the tree
and under the bobcat branch
and up to the grasses
and came to a dead stop
wondering how I'd got so far
and how much I'd missed.
I turned around to find
I was standing
under the last pagoda tree
on the path.
Thank you,
I said,
for bringing me back.
