The Tree Poems

by Phil Boiarski

I

On the fly leaf,
I leave words.
Implied leaves
flutter past, green
gone brown, slow
leaving so soon.

Let go, I write,
we are fated not
to be left out
on a limb, made
not to stick around.

II

Laughing aspens
shake their golden
garments, drying
in the wind, dying
in a sigh of fluttered
wings, flapping
joyous end to their
old awakening.
Maples, hickories,
poplars, apples
celebrate their coming
nakedness by putting
on their brightest dress,
dancing in this lessening
light as nights grow
and roots contemplate
snow falling like
the leaves.

III

The spirit of trees
comforts, cradle
to coffin. In wood
shelters, on oaken
chairs, we hide
behind doors.

The grain in wood,
an image of time,
crosscut rings
emanating out
from the heartwood,
from the moment
seed took root
in the sunlight.

Shade becomes
bony shadow but
the light at night
beholds all things
with tenderness,
caresses, softens
hard edges, offers
the eye surcease
in the subtleties
of darkness.
IV

Morning breeze
brings the sound
of rain falling
not from skies
but leaves.
Clouds, having
moved on,
look back
and hear
trees whisper
the soft, wet
story of their past.

V

Underfoot, the crush
of leaves gives off
whispers of summer sun,
hush of starlit nights,
musty essence of time
in their becoming dust.

# # #
Phil Boiarski has been writing and publishing for more than forty years. His work has appeared a number of times in The Paris Review, The California Quarterly, The Rocky Mountain Review, The Ohio Journal, Aspen Anthology, Indiana Writes, Handbook, Green House and numerous other publications. Recently, his poems were translated and published in Nowa Okolica Poetow, a Polish literary journal, OFF_ Antologia, a bi-lingual literary magazine published in London & Warsaw; Private Photo Review, an Italian poetry/photo magazine, and The Tangled Bank, an Australian anthology celebrating Darwin’s bi-centennial.
www.boiarski.com
www.boiarskitheblog.blogspot.com