Tree Assignment

This is a test of the Emergency Poetry Writing System.
Your assignment is “Tree,”
The thing you never hope to see
Something more beautiful than.

You plain don’t see a tree the way you see a cloud.
You’re never on your back beneath one
Thinking of the leaves’ mast: There’s a rabbit.
There’s a running man.

You do hear it warning, though, on windy days.
Shaking its head to slip the blow, it hopes.
What can it do but stand tall, take it
As only a big tree can.

If this had been an actual emergency, your assignment would be “God.”

Copyright © 2003, Richard Laurence Baron. Photo courtesy of University of California at Santa Cruz, with thanks.