Entanglements or Potential

A few months ago, the wind snapped off a small rotting tree and dropped it on top of my maple tree. It was causing the maple to lean, and I was concerned that it would cause it to be permanently damaged. I tried cutting a chunk off the bottom, but it was still too heavy to move. I tried wedging it against the big gum tree to get it to fall, but it was so entangled in the top of the maple that it would not come down. This weekend my neighbor Scott came over and I cut four sections letting it drop each time. At this point a smaller part of the trunk was still hanging in the maple tree. We both got hold of it and with some effort were able to drag it down and cut it up.

Don’t let the entanglements of 2022

follow you into the New Year

Take steps in working them out

Perhaps with a little help from a friend

will help turn them into potential

Photo: Dwight L. Roth

Glorious Morning

Morning bursts forth in all its radiant glory,

peering through the sheltered woods,

highlighting trees, dancing on flowers.

Steppingstones draw me to

the damp creek.

Frogs bury themselves in mud keeping cool

Morning breezes will soon shift

But, for now, the glorious morning shimmers.

Backyard Painting: Dwight L. Roth

Today, at d’Verse. Linda asked us to write a 44 word Quadrille using the word morning.

Join us at: https://dversepoets.com

Scars of a Broken Heart

It was a warm Sunday afternoon. Jim took a small hand-ax with him as he climbed the ridge behind her farm. They had been friends since primary school, but now, seven years later she had broken his heart. Tommy Butler beat him to the draw, asking Julie Anne to the middle school dance… and she said yes.

With all his strength he chopped at the initials carved into the side of the tall sugar maple. He carved them there when he was thirteen. Now it was a bleeding scar where a heart of love once lived.

When Jim, told George what he had done, a smile crossed his wise old, wrinkled face.

“When I was your age, I had a girl who broke my heart as well. She played with my heart, then ‘she’d had it sliced away leaving a scar’. It still hurts.”

Photo: Dwight L. Roth

Today at d’Verse, Sarah asked us to write a prosery story of 144 words, which must include the line: ‘she’d had it sliced away leaving a scar’. from a poem by Michael Donaghy. (https://rihlajourney.wordpress.com/2010/12/27/liverpool-michael-donaghy/)

I decided to continue my conversations of Jim and his friend Old George.

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Putting up memories

This is the first time in ten years that we have done all the decorating ourselves. The grandchildren not have other pursuits and are grown and busy, so we spent the morning digging up memories as we sorted through our tub of ornaments from my school children of past years and of friends and co-workers. It was fun to revisit each one again and try to recall who gave them to us or where we purchased them.

So many memories

revisited each Christmas

Each one hung with joy

~Merry Christmas~

Photos: Dwight L. Roth

Autumn Moon – (haiku)

Autumn Moon bathing

trees with shades of whitewash

Smoke drifts from chimney

Painting : Dwight L. Roth

Persephone’s Marks

Trees tell their stories

written with green and red ink.

Leaves of history long forgotten…

as Persephone comes and goes,

get trampled under foot after each season.

But, her promised return

instills a flicker of hope in our hearts.

Each year a ring of life is added…

a library of tales from summers past

when growth was fat or lean…

only told by the rings inside.

Until they die, they remain unseen!!

Photos: Dwight L. Roth

Today at d’Verse, Sarah asked us to write a poem from Greek Mythology that included some aspect of Persephone and her comings and goings to Hades in the underworld. The myth is that when she comes she brings spring and summer for six months, but when she goes, everything dies and remains so for six months. I thought trees are a great way to illustrate that by observing their rings.

Join us at: https://dversepoets.com 

People and Trees

If people loved us like trees,

we would be loved unconditionally

in each season of our life…

finding comforting shade

in our towering strength

admiring our refined appearance

planted on a landscape of beauty…

and, in the Fall of life

they would make special effort

to come before Winter

to see all the magnificent beauty

of our changing foliage…

the myriad array of colors

that makes us special;

before they’re is gone

with the cold winds of change

and our balding head and limbs

put in brick boxes with windows

injected with composting material…

observed from time to time

as we slowly waste away.

Photos: Dwight L. Roth

Posting this for Open Link night at d’Verse Poets Pub.

Join us at: https://dversepoets.com

Morning Bursts Forth

Morning bursts forth in all its radiant glory

Peering into the dark sheltered woods

Highlighting the trees dancing on flowers

The stepping stones draw me to the trees

To the mysterious woods sheltering the creek

Turning to mush in summer’s heat

Frogs buried in the mud keep cool

Sending out their sharp croaks calling for someone to hear

Morning breezes soon shift to a sauna of heat and humidity

But for now the glorious morning rests on the yellow buttercups

Red salvia bathed in the sunlight reach toward the heavens

Calling me to come join them

In the exhilaration of the beckoning day

iPhone Photo: Dwight L. Roth

This is one of my favorite poems. that I have posted before, but it keeps calling me to repost it again and again!

Rings and Wrinkles

“When you split your own wood, it warms your twice!”

I loved taking the maul and lifting it back over my head, bring it down hard enough to make the wood fly in both directions. I split my own firewood for many years, until one day I ended up with two ruptured discs. We had a fireplace insert wood stove that provide a lot of good heat from that wood. It is true what they say, “When you split your own wood, it warms your twice!” After my back surgery, I got smart and purchased a used wood splitter which saved my back and worked very well.

Cutting through the tree trunks with a chainsaw was exciting to me. I never knew what I would fine inside. Narrow rings and wide rings revealed dry years and wet years. Counting the rings gave me an idea how old the tree might be. Sometimes there were hollow rotten spaces, filled with termites or ants, that showed the tree was not in the best of health. Wood is a great renewable resource, when trees are replanted and managed for the future.

Rings left in a tree

Like wrinkles on our faces

Nature’s History Book

How old do you think this oak tree might have been?!

Photos: Dwight L. Roth

Where no Trees Grow

There are some who can’t wait to go

To a far off planet where trees don’t grow

Perhaps to Mars cooled so long ago

Barren terrain where no rivers flow

Jagged peaks glistening without snow

Seems like a long trip through space // we know

Yet, some still wish for a chance to go

To a far away planet where trees don’t grow

~ No… I think I will stay ~

Where grass grows green under my feet

And the air is breathable and sweet

Buzzing bees and butterflies eat

Oceans blue and gurgling creeks

I will stay here but not repeat

For life on Earth is short and fleet(ing)

So enjoy blue skies as a songbird’s tweet

On this big blue ball that nothing can beat

In this wonderful place where trees grow sweet

Painting: Dwight L. Roth