A Tree, A Home

What must it be like to be a tree?

To spend my whole life buried from the waist down,

My thirsty toes slowly clawing their way deeper.

No arms or hands to hold what I love,

But letting others live on my head and in my hair,

Jumping, climbing, crawling, dancing, singing.

Some causing me pain, eating away at me,

Others are simply grateful for a home.

My children fall from my head to the ground,

As if I were Zeus and they, Athena

Some stay near, our toes touching, intertwined,

While others wander, carried away to unknown lands

By wind or rain or by those who make me their home,

Never to be seen again.

I live as long as humans, but only know one home

Stuck in place with no way out...

Until they find me.

Then I am cut down and broken,

Shredded and torn, beaten, cut to pieces,

Scattered to a thousand places.

I become an office building, a door.

A bag, a box, a napkin.

Someone’s homework or report.

A warm fire to sit by at night.

The soil, creating a place for my family to grow.

A theatre, a music hall, a museum, a school.

An envelope, a letter to a loved one.

A piece of art; a painting, a book, an essay.

Or a home again.