The Tree and the Thoughts It Brings

I'm captivated by this towering, old tree a few steps into the woods in our backyard. Interested in such a way that I walk to the back window several times a day to look at it. I step out onto the deck and shift sideways, looking for the perfect view of it, with the hill rising at its base. I think about designing our backyard, and benches come to mind. Ornate, lovely benches to sit alongside of it, and complement the graceful lines of that tree.

It's got a little magic to it. Feels like anything that has been around that long must have a secret.

I trimmed branches and brambles in a path through the woods, intending to wind up at the tree. I know that if I sit under it, I will think strong thoughts and imagine fantastical things.

I remember at 14 I would lay in the tall, soft grass underneath a willow and write, and think and watch clouds. That was when I started with poetry, and would draw pages full of word-association bubbles, with spindles to connect the ideas. That was when I let the words run through me and out my fingertips for the first time. That was a magic of itself, like letting An Other take over and say things you didn't even know you had inside.

It still feels that way, when it steals me over, and I feel that I have to get away quickly and let it flood in. That the connections have to be made and put down when I'm tapped into that moment. Right? You sense the stream passing by and through, the stream of the poem or the scene or the beginning of something. And you just have to let it pour on through.