The Tree

The tree has grown blighted
once tall and strong oak
the fruit once delicious
and full
I once quelled my thirst
it was moist,
and now the fruit is rotting
on it’s branches
hunger pushed me forth
to discover life beyond
The tree in my backyard
where dad built
a treehouse
with his carpenter’s hands,
dark hands young with strength
he would grab mom around her slim
waist,
and there was love in the house,
where the boys once played in the yard
often Boi, the elder of the two
forgot to take out the trash
dad would wrap the belt
the leather strap was stability
a boundary we hated to cross
we danced around a tree so strong
in those days,
It was one of God’s trees
He planted it,
and it was beautiful to me,
Heroic and Peaceful,
He watched over us,
I didn’t think about being Catholic
But I knew Lord you watched over
every single one of us,
the tender branches,
the leaves yellow and gold,
green with veins that drank life,
Yes, Lord You stood
the sky was new then,
clouds I imagined as cotton candy
as sweet to the breath and to the dreams
filled with a potential,
when I danced underneath the willow tree,
where the caterpillars all gathered to watch me,
near the neighbor’s home,
Marge in her wheelchair after the stroke,
dad, you watered the grass
in your early 30’s,
in green army pants,
cut to the knee,
we lived on a side street
once a week we gathered
to play mush ball,
there was no deficiet to be lowered
no Obama,
or Boehner with his orange skin
peeling,
just young pieces of fruit
rushing about with eyes,
just born
Lawrence Welk
would say,
tank ya, tank ya,
there were circles in the
world,
rings of reconciliation
The Holocaust
was a word I didn’t
know
I hadn’t been seared
with images
of naked piles
of emaciated human beings,
no bulldozer to clear them away,
There was the Tree
strong in it’s roots in the backyard,
unspoiled, simple
where I often hung my heart
on it’s branches,
mom near the clothes line,
the flowers blooming near
the kitchen window
no facebook,
no inter-net that made
us lonelier
loneliness was understood then
not the make-believe blur
it is now
progress has opened doors
to dimensions
of shame
and dimensions
of uneasiness,
and windows have been thrown
open to senseless violence
there is a tree,
and the children who created roads
in the dirt
still sit trying to mix enough water
my sisters made pies that tasted
like mud
I never saw a homeless man or woman
on the corner
Disneyland once a year
movies on Saturday afternoons
Lost in Space and Gilligan’s Island
after school
I rode a bike that was stolen
it crushed me to believe
others would steal
giggles in the rooms
secret crushes of Peter O’Toole
pomegrantes filled with secrets
were the spiders in the walls
The Tree begin to look different
through jaded eyes
the crow’s feet
my dad stopped dancing
with my mom around the tree
her slim waist held no appetite
screaming and hauntings grew more
frequent
The Wizard pulled the curtain
and I witnessed the frailty of a man
and a woman
teenagers who married
the illusion of the tree
withering leaves
bugs that moved into
it’s pockets
began to destroy
I wept
as I saw two prisoners
trapped
children with adult faces
marriages of their own
the tree chopped down
elderly parents
the pavement ripped up
by bulldozers
the numbers of my address
1422
once splashed across the house
a stranger now looks into the windows
It is a different tree
no children dance around it
still I see my heart carved
into it’s skin
If I touch you,
would you remember
I once sat in your branches
dreaming of this moment
but in your knotted arms
I was another
your tears would
I feel the water
against my cheek
no tree house
many seasons separate us
If I dance around your trunk
would you return the years
if only briefly Lord
but the years have made me
a stranger
to this tree,
and to myself
I feel all the missed prayers
begging to be spoken
asking me to pass them onto
You Lord,
You Are my Tree
standing Tall
Shade me now,
as I rest upon
Your Branches
to sleep
in The Strength of Your Arms
to know once again
The Springtime
of seasons I misunderstood
A Peace mistakingly given
to childhood
a Joy I shared with the tree
as I danced delighting in the prospect
of years
that were ahead,
Remember me
when I have forgotten
The Tree
when years
may wind me into paths
of no memories
I will smile today
as Your Soul inhabits mine
when You set the tree
to shade me as a child
and gave me it’s body
to play in