100 Leaves

100 Leaves

The tree holds the ground beneath in a shadow

you can see only what the wind can wrestle away.

I can’t see where the birds hide their nests when the sky is overcast and grey.

Where are the seedlings?

I take care with my steps and look hard to find them.

Is that one, under a hundred leaves?

Why are your branches so dense and strong?

They feel like a wall.

Are you keeping a secret?

Protecting your roots?

Or, hiding something precious and small?

Some trees are evergreen

and keep their leaves year-round.

But will you lose yours next fall?

I hope you do, for then we might see what you hide behind your leaves.

I crossed your shadow.

I swung from your branches.

I bathed in your dappled lace of limbs and leaves.

I peered between blinks of sunlight and saw the monuments- the trunks of your kin trees.

I looked up in the sky,

scattered and shattered patches of a vast canopy.

And I felt small, so very small.

Do you reach for the sky for warmth?

Do you stretch your limbs to find connection?

Do your roots explore the core of the Earth?

Or do the 1200 leaves at my feet await a magic carpet of wind that whisks them away to wonderful adventures where children trample them in a symphony of joy and delight?

You refresh the breeze, ignite imagination, all with your presence dear tree.

You carpet the ground and nourish your seedlings with your one hundred leaves.

Thank you for sheltering the- so many creatures and the insects, some smaller than I can see.

Thanks for the light show, the story in shadows and the respite from the heat of the day.

At twilight’s approach, the breeze lifts a new plaything,

A carpet of gold and green on the breeze.

dancing, and tossing.

They sing on the wind and follow their dreams. The dreams of your 100 leaves.