Declaration of the Trees

The search for light
that calls us out of darkness
is the word
that asks us to begin.
The shoots we send
are messengers of love.
We wedge them in
between the rocks and asphalt.
Roots dig in
and leaves are sent to harvest,
feather thin,
but mighty in their weight.
Then comes the wind
to toss us and refresh us.

Still the light
is liquor and is food.
The soil is good.
It grows us and sustains us.
Growth is green
and stretches limb by limb
to firm the trunk.

Growth gives us strength to sway,
parts air and reaches
for next steps on the way.
Sunlight teaches
the way that we should go,
not walk, but climb
to where the air is gladdened.

If flame or god, 
it matters not a whit.
It's whiskey light
we drink like milk each morning.
Days are calm
and often nights translucent.
Even storms
that flash and wash the heavens
are the norm
for every living thing.
We stand and wait.
We know light shall prevail.
It cannot fail
because as fire feeds us,
so we feed
to flame the oxygen it needs,
and so make light
of giving and of taking;
take delight
in what we have and are
and may become.
The darker side of fire,
ash and smoke,
is not a thing we cling to.

We admit that fire seeks our soul;
that what flame needs
is what dead soul becomes:
the once moist core
that lifted and constrained us,
carried sap
by bucketsful to feed us,
now dry bones.
It's true that fire kills
and coals may sing.
Bur fire does not pray,
is far too proud
to ever kneel for blessing.
Youthful flame
is not a humble thing,
cannot bend down
and hold a bent position.
Flame intends to be what it cannot:
the red hot sun.

A tree is not a god,
but seeks God's face
and, finding, hunkers down
in time and place.
to pry and squeeze, 
oppress to make rock fertile.
This makes of us a way,
a bridge between
hard feet dug into soil
and heady space
that only tips can tap.

So we hang on,
mount air as if by ladder,
rung by rung,
and ring in each year's growth.
We wrap up tight
at Christmastime our presence,
each year's hopes,
and wrap fears unconfessed
in bark and phloem.

You should know
we are closer related than you think.
We are your cousins.
We stood before you stood
and first knew love
of earth and rain and wind,
the starry sky
that draws us like a magnet.
We were your friends
before you sharpened steel
and set your saws
like fire to our limbs.

Should you pretend
to be what you are not,
we trees will mock
and not with leafy laughter,
but with death
that sucks breath from your lungs
until we die,
again, in close relation.
We will not leave in blessing
and good will.
You shall not have
our benediction.