When A Tree Falls 2013 (Newest Poem)

[ArtMatters]

Maybe when a tree falls in the forest and finally no one is around,

It screams bloody murder

Maybe the gentle tapping of branches,

like skeleton fingers on my windowpane

Is trying to get my attention..

To let me know the grass isn’t greener on the other side at all,

In fact it’s quickly turning to yellow, then ochre, and brown

Maybe the vines crawling up our stone and brick walls

are trying to escape

Climbing towards the sky trying to avoid suffocating

in concrete and metal tombs

If I reach out and slice one leaf open, it will warn the others

But there isn’t time to prepare

And I have quite the unfair advantage..

Luckily their fate with me is but a glimpse

Of the torture their cousin arugula will endure

When I add her to my salad

But…If I eat all of the salad…

what will the bunnies eat?

If I displace the bunnies in order to plow the field,..

To plant the seed, harvest the crop, and make all of these salads

Who will plant more bunnies?

Who will plant more deer, more toads, more nests for birds to rest?

Who will plant more trees?

And care for and keep the bees?

Maybe the trees will uproot and march

Take to the hills on uneven terrain

All of them clustered together,

creating enough oxygen to get the whole forest high

Even the insects and mice

Plotting their sweetest revenge

The Douglas fir; leader of the bunch

Will enlist a team of shrubbery, a sniper dandelion (for those with allergies),

and a slew of other plants to do his bidding

Tumble weeds covered in poison ivy,

Carnivorous plants working overtime,

And clusters of slick, gooey seaweed getting purged from the sea

Building great green salty walls of potassium and iodine

When the streams run crimson and the planet is secured

The remaining flowers will begin to weep:

Small seeds and chunks of pollen

They never wanted it to come to this…

And the rose recalls his first encounter with a human

When his wife’s death became a symbol of love

And he relives that beautiful sadness

His red petals cascade gently down..

And disappear into the viscous rivers