Knees quaking, I recited that famous first line, “I think that I shall never see a poem lovely as a tree” penned by Joyce Kilmer and delivered at an Arbor Day school assembly some five decades ago. The highlight of the celebration was the gift of a young sapling to each student. I toddled home with mine, grabbed a shovel, the poem still circulating in my head, and planted that tree. It was like planting a promise and it did just that, growing to be a strapping tree, and five decades later it’s about to bloom and leaf out like it does every spring.
Arbor day is upon us again, making everyone a tree hugger, at least on April 28. I spent many of my college afternoons wandering the arboretum admiring trees for some botany class. Little did I realize that several decades later, I would be doing almost the same thing, wandering the woods in search of the best specimen, lucky enough to have struck up many friendships beneath the canopy.
So when the animals evade our watchful eyes, my friends and I turn to the trees and they give us plenty of material as we put in our miles on the Metacomet Trail. The patterns of bark, the amount of mast, the arrangements of branches all spark our narrative on the trail. Colors are discussed and new names are called forth to describe what is in front of our noses, the trees. The beech leaves, hanging on since last spring protecting their leaf buds, don’t seem just boring old tan, we can do better and decide that “foamy sarsaparilla” is a better color descriptor. We breathe in a bit more deeply thanks to the oxygenated air, or ponder what their root system must look like as it holds the soil in place. And mostly we admire their longevity and stateliness. We will come across one with an exceptional girth and swap our color chart for a history lesson. We immediately launch into a conversation about what this plot of land looked like years ago, when these elder trees were young and standing tall over a stone wall or two. The conversation can’t help but spiral into our imagination thoughts of what life might have been like and whether we would trade places.
We don’t just admire the strong. After all, aren’t the meek set to inherit the earth? So, our energy encompasses those trees which present the best widow makers and woodpecker holes. Some trees find their way into our dialogue due to their appendages – fascinating galls, burls and shelf fungus. The gnarliness does nothing but add to the overall appeal. I am mindful that in times of sadness, I am drawn to walk in the company of trees. They calm me, and if I am alone, I am quick to start the tape of Kilmer’s poem racing in my head. After a few renditions, I lapse into other poems I have committed to memory and thoughts of the English teachers behind those efforts. It’s just another nod to a bygone era in which value was placed on memorization. I realize that there is not much higher order thinking involved, but it’s calming as I put one foot in front of the other.
And, as further proof that higher order thinking can be fleeting, when at home, I am often plunked in an Adirondack chair under a tree watching the chickens peck. This in itself is far from remarkable, except the tree which I sit under has seen better days. The bark has burst open revealing a large Harry Potteresque vine choking the tree. There are hardly any leaves and a multitude of limbs ready to plummet to the earth. So, most likely I’ll meet my maker as I sit under that tree, unsuspecting as some large branch clunks me on the head. If it doesn’t finish me off, at least it may knock some sense into me.