Tag: tree climbing

Wings of my Heart

sunset cuppa

I am searching the world for you, my love. Builder of treehouses and brewer of the perfect cuppa tea. Lover of pugs and dreamer of a quieter, more peaceful planet. Birdwatcher, dream chaser, river rafter, tree climber. We have walked in the still of the night, under the same stars and sliver of a moon. We see them but from a different side of the world. I somehow know that you are in Scotland, I scoured the rolling hills and thick woodlands. Hiked the highlands and the lowlands but somehow find you online of all places! Ready to dig in the lush dirt of your native farmlands. Co-mingle our rich dirt, loamy with peaty. My clay, silt, sand, gravel and yes even boulders with your Peaty Gleys and podzols. Piping hot bowls of Scottish Oats with Irish Butter. Earl Grey Tea with Tupelo Honey. This morning the sun rose early above the hickory grove. The sky was a particular shade of deep red vermillion. The frost hung onto the weeds and branches waiting for the heat of the day, which today would be a brisk 37, but at sunrise was 12. My heart hangs in the tops of the trees, I graze on hickory nuts, husking the woody outer shell onto the frozen ground below. My mind has flown south for the winter, leaving my heart alone in this frozen wasteland. Without the ability to reason I long to take flight, to lift off, to soar high above the frozen rivers and lakes. I fly south by south-west until the heavens start to turn to deep hues of Ultramarine and the horizon is on fire with a burst of shocking pink. It seems impossible, and unfathomable to see these colors at the same time. Only from the wings of my heart, seeking the warmth of your shoulder to lean upon. To have you wrap your strong arms around my tiny frame in comparison to yours. You are an artist that paints with your dreams, which have been distilled down into pure hues and luminous powders that when water is added become another color altogether. You paint my naked body with robes of saffron. You have milked the Garcinia trees for centuries to have your storehouses of resin. The flat round cakes that are stacked like poker chips in scarlet red velvet satchels. You carry them on your back along with tiny cobalt blue vials of dragon tears. You are my alchemist, the edge pieces of my puzzle that make it so effortless for me to take the next breath and the next, like a child that has followed the same dirt path to school for years, knowing how each step feels beneath their bare feet. I wear no mask for you. I climb out of my lookout, high in the treetops and put on the water for a cuppa tea with you. Earl Grey with Tupelo Honey.

At Home in the Woods

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She longed to blend in, to never be noticed and to become one with her surroundings. Mea Lama, drifted off with the geese as they flew south for the winter. We aren’t quite sure of the date. It was somewhere between the last perfect day of autumn and the first flakes of snowfall in the winter of her hundred and twenty-third year. She was often seen perched up high in the trees, like a hunter waiting for the turkeys to waddle through the thicket, though she wasn’t a hunter. Instead, she was a watcher of birds, of squirrels and of herds of deer as they made their way through the forests. She climbed trees to free the leaves that were stuck, that hadn’t had the good fortune to turn robin red, russet and golden yellow and drift gracefully to the ground. She climbed trees all winter plucking leaves and releasing them. She felt at home up there, amongst the furry woodland creatures.
She didn’t go to town to socialize. She didn’t hang out at the coffee shop to gab. She had that “Fuck Off” air that kept most people at an arm’s length away from her. She would have pieces of twigs and leaves in her hair and stuck to whatever she was wearing, often leaving a trail of forest debris in her wake. She was most at home in the woods. She loved the silence broken by the creaking branches, the whistle of the wind and the chatter of the squirrels who had become used to her in their territory.
By the time spring arrived in Fairfield, a small midwestern town amongst the cornfields of Southeastern Iowa, she would have all the leaves removed from each and every tree. The buds loved the ease in which they could burst forth with the first warm sunny days and the spring rains. Mea made life easier to be a tree. She spent the spring and summers clearing the forests and woods of all dead branches and fallen trees. She kept busy all year tending to trees.
She will be remembered for her actions, not her words. She would often come to Open Mic at Cafe Paradiso, on the North West corner of the town square and stand on stage for her allotted 10 minutes. She’d push play on her old Sony Tape player and play the sounds she had recorded from high in the trees. She’d gaze off thru the windows at the back of the room. She never spoke a word and no one asked her any questions. It was odd, but the locals liked it.