The Tree No One Planted
The tree no one planted
plants itself everywhere—
fencerow, alley, the seam
where garage meets ground.
We call it weed.
We call it volunteer.
The birds call it food.
The catbird knows
what we refuse:
the branch bent low with fruit,
red going to black
going to ink.
She takes the gift
with her whole gray body,
chin stained like a child’s,
like mine, like yours.
White mulberry crossed with red,
neither one nor the other,
a tree of two minds
that settled on neither.
Still it feeds them—
the catbird, the bluebird,
thrush in the shadow,
vireos passing through,
deer on their hind legs
reaching high leaves.
What did the tree ask
in return for all that sugar?
Only this: carry the seed.
Only this: spread me far and wide.
And the birds say yes,
and we say no,
and either way the fruit comes back each June,
dark and certain,
a stain you don’t wash off,
a gift when we choose it,
a weed when it chooses us.
I long to be a tree for just one day. To know how it feels to have bird toes alight on my branches. To share my abundant fruit. To provide safe haven for a bird to nest under cover of my leaves. I close my eyes and imagine like a child because you wrote this beautiful ode and showed me through gorgeous photographs—what that would feel like. Thanks for the smile.
This is lovely. Especially the idea that a tree "chooses us".