TREES AND ME

 

I love nature…everything about her…

her mountains, her flowers, her animals, her oceans…her sky, her seas…

and from the time I was born I’ve had a certain affinity for her trees.

I wonder if that’s because throughout my life…whatever has come down the pike

I have come to realize how in so many ways…trees and I are alike.

We both have branches…although granted trees have a little more than me

branches meant to support, protect whoever lands on us…our friends…our family.

We both grow tall, live a long time…and have the ability to enthrall

Okay, trees live a lot longer than me and next to them I’m short and small.

But we both have roots that nourish our family that spread out like tentacles… 

Okay, mine are figurative…Hey! I said we were alike…not identical.

As we grow older…

when more wrinkles show up on its bark 

and more wrinkles show up on me…

this is the point just by looking…you see how I resemble a tree.

Just more proof it is always important…to look beyond the wrinkled bark…

look beyond the wrinkled skin

for the essence of who we are…the heart of the tree and me…

will always be found within.

Over the years as I’ve looked at people and trees…(and there’ve been a huge amount)

whatever their outside looks like…I’ve found it’s what inside all of us that counts.

I wish more people would say to themselves…

in this world as we search for peace and joy and harmony…

“I only have to look as far 

as inside the trees…

and me”.

DAILY GRATITUDE BUTTERFLIES

 

I am grateful for butterflies…

I adhere to the Native American point of view

that if you whisper a wish to a butterfly

there’s a good chance that wish will come true…

I’ve done this many times and I have to say…

how often I’ve been surprised…

which is great because I have a lot of wishes left…

and there are a lot of butterflies.

BUTTERFLIES

 

Every time we marvel at the beauty of the butterflies…

and a smile lights up our face

we should also marvel at all the changes

it took to get them to this place

BUTTERFLY IN THE RAIN

 

 If you read my poems I’m sure you can tell by the words I use

how often my child and adult are uniting…

but there are times, like today, when the adult in me takes a break

and I let my child do the writing.

It’s not that I don’t appreciate his input (yes this is his child speaking)

It’s just that sometimes I’m not after the same answers he is seeking.

Take today for instance…outside it started to sprinkle 

and as I watched a butterfly visit flowers in this part of her domain….

I stopped to ask that butterfly, “Where do you go when it rains”.

I’m pretty sure the adult in me knew the answer

(There’s a book about butterflies he keeps upon the shelf)

but I preferred to get my information from the butterfly herself.

She said, “I usually looks for safe and dry places…the same places I like to sleep at night

In a hollow of a tree, under leaves…somewhere I can protect my leaves for flight.”

As the rain came down a little harder…she said, “Come and follow me!”

then she flew and found some refuge in a nearby blue spruce tree.

She said,  “We butterflies are lucky…Mother Nature has provided us a brain…

that allows us to find natural umbrellas that shelter us from the rain”.

As we spoke I couldn’t help but notice…although the rain had filled the sky

the needles she chose to hide under protected this butterfly.

She looked at me and smiled…the from the lips of the smartest butterfly I’ve ever met…

She said, “I notice how I’m up here high and dry…while you’re down there getting wet.”

I admit I felt a little embarrassed…when with laughter she couldn’t contain…

that little butterfly stopped to ask me…”Where do I go in the rain?”

Then she said, “It doesn’t matter…you are soaking wet I see…

and since it’s still raining why don’t you come and share this tree with me.”

So there I sat under the blue spruce tree…conversing with a butterfly

while the rain fell all around me…and only one of us was dry.

The adult in me would not have wanted to get wet…

would not have followed that butterfly into that blue spruce tree…

but this soaking wet child couldn’t help but think 

there is no place I’d rather be..

DAILY GRATITUDE COURAGE

 

I am grateful what courage I possess….each and every day…

How even though I have no way of knowing what is around the bend…

with the courage I possess, 

I turn the corner anyway.

MIRACLES IN CORNERS

 

If you believe, as I do, in fairy tales….

then believe this message from Little Jack Horner….

who with only his thumb discovered

miracles can be found in the most unlikely of corners

 

PUR LITTLE CORNERS

 

I know there are some people out there who in their hearts believe that…

in spite of all the evidence to the contrary our planet Earth…is flat!

When I hear this…I admit…I am astounded…

for I believe the scientists and my own eyes…when I say the Earth is rounded.

I say rounded because due to centrifugal force, gravity and the whims of our creator

Earth flattens out a little at each of her poles and bugles at her equator.

Which technically makes her an oblate spheroid as scientists have found…

but for the purposes of this poem…It’s okay to call her round.

I’m not interested in her exact measurements, her circumference or her girth

today I’m interested in her corners…yes in the corners of round Earth.

Figuratively Earth has a multitude of corners…corners specific to you and me…

my little corner of the world consists of my friends and family.

Which means every family out there has their own corner…corners they can see

and we do our best to make our little corners of the world…as happy as they can be. 

And since we’re talking about the Earth…no matter how you spin it…

we each hope our little corner of the world…will smile on everybody in it.

But such is the the nature of the Earth…if you travel at all you might suspect…

none of our corners stand alone…they all intersect.

Which means and I’m sorry for the convoluted nature of this poem…

how to get to the point it took me a while…

But if we tried a little harder at the points where our corners intersect

perhaps we could make the whole world smile?