Trees standing alone,
trees standing together,
a parade, a council,
a hermit on the hillside.

 

Trees of imagination and memory.

Trees of childhood,
trees that we told our secrets to,

street trees at 10 am, talking among
themselves after the neighborhood empties out.

Guardians, teachers, friends,
trees with clumps of winter cloud

in their leaves,
later their branches will embrace

the moon.

​

from the poem

“Thinking with Trees” ©2016  J. Ruth Gendler