This is the Open Write, a place for educators to nurture their writing lives and to advocate for writing poetry in community. We are here every month. Yesterday, today, and tomorrow, our friends Jessica Wiley and Erica Johnson invite us to celebrate the place they call home (and our own places) with this series: Homage to Arkansas, the “Natural State”. Our next Open Write will be June 20-22.
Our Host
Erica lives in Jacksonville, Arkansas with her “old man dog,” Cooper. She has been an educator for 14 years, teaching AP and College-level courses to high school students in Vilonia. She is the “fearless leader” of the online community known as Teach Write and a host for Advanced Kentucky. She is a lover of all things related to the written word and dabbles in other artistic expressions as well.
Inspiration
When it comes to living in the Natural State it’s hard to escape celebrating and writing about anything related to nature. Even here, at Ethical ELA, we are constantly writing poetry about weather, flowers, rivers, birds, and other critters. But I think it’s been a bit since we’ve focused on the majestic trees that provide us with everything from shade to shelter to sustenance. Each state has one selected, but there are even nations that have picked a tree to represent their country. So let’s take today to celebrate or honor your favorite tree or investigate a tree native to your region of the world.
You may even want to take a look at the poem “The Apple Trees at Olema” by Robert Hass.
Process
Select a tree that interests you. Perhaps it’s one growing outside your window or maybe it’s the tree recognized by your state or nation as THE tree to represent you or maybe it’s a tree you carry with you from childhood memories.
Once you have your tree in mind, take some time to write everything down you can about the tree. Tap in to all of your senses or find that one story where the tree takes center stage. The poem that you write can take on just about any style or form.
Erica’s Poem
Loblolly by Erica Johnson
These were the trees that towered
in my pawpaw’s backyard:
guardians of the honeysuckle twining the fence
and a trio of little girls brewing potions.
From pine trees to pints of ice cream
the name Loblolly has journeyed far–
though perhaps not as far as their seeds
sent out to touch the stars
and return home as moon trees–
But at one time Loblolly called to the muck
and now swirls pleasantly each summer in a cup.
Our state tree now a local creamery
and in my head is sticky sweet whimsy
instead of just thick and sticky slop.
Your Turn
Now, scroll to the comment section below to write your own poem. (This is a public space, so you may choose to use only your first name or initials depending on your privacy preferences.) Not ready? That’s okay. Read the poems already posted for more inspiration. Ponder your own throughout the day. Return later. And, if the prompt does not work for you, that is fine. All writing is welcome. Just write something. Oh, and a note about drafting: Since we are writing in short bursts, we all understand (and even welcome) the typos and partial poems that remind us we are human and that writing is always becoming. If you’d like to invite other teachers to write with us, tell them to subscribe. Also, please be sure to respond to at least three writers.
Thanks Erica for such an evocative prompt. I hope to return to it when I have more time for describing the many trees of my life. Perhaps I could even write a series of poems. For today, the trusty tricube helped me write something in a short amount of time.
Love the nostalgia of your “Loblolly” poem.
———————————————————————
My History in Trees
visiting
grandparents
meant pine trees
grew up on
Raintree Drive
no trees there
pecan trees
shaded our
first backyard
Okay, I will admit to a MASSIVE sneezing fit and snot-filled morning before I wrote my poem…
Georgia Trees
People talk about Georgia trees
like they are blessings—
And I get it, I do.
They are beautiful—
the cathedral spread of live oaks,
magnolias opening thick and white as Sunday gloves,
dogwoods drifting soft as prayer
through the edge of spring.
They speak of willow branches
trailing green fingers through swamp water,
of pecan trees dropping riches into waiting hands,
of peaches blushing gold-pink in the heat.
And Lord, they are beautiful.
Beautiful enough to make a person stop the car.
Beautiful enough to ache a little looking at them.
But my body has never trusted beauty
that arrives carrying pollen.
Georgia blooms
and I begin to lose myself—
eyes watering,
throat tightening,
head packed thick with pressure
like the whole season is trying
to root itself inside my ears, deep in my face,
invading and attacking first in the nose.
Pine pollen dusts the world yellow.
Oak drifts through the air
like somebody shredded sunlight.
Sweetgum tassels fall.
Cherry trees burst open.
And I stand there sneezing
through the glory of it all.
Every season here
comes dressed like a love story
and hits like a punishment.
Still, I cannot hate them.
Not really.
Because even through swollen eyes
and medicine-fogged mornings,
afternoons,
and nights…
I know what they are trying to do.
Grow.
Flower.
Reach toward light
without apology.
And maybe there is something holy in that—
this reckless insistence on becoming
despite the suffering it causes
the rest of us.
And Lord, they are beautiful.
Beautiful enough to make a person stop the car.
Beautiful enough to ache a little looking at them.
From behind a window.
Melanie, a stanza in your poems serves as a mataphor for the challenges of teaching.
“And maybe there is something holy in that—
this reckless insistence on becoming
despite the suffering it causes
the rest of us.
As we reflect on some of our “challenging” students and think of them as “trees” striving to become what God made them to be! Wow! Makes we wonder how often I proved to be weeds or fertilizers during their growth years. Sometimes when students were tempted to use the “S: word to describe an assignnent, I’d giggle as say, “maybe this is the fertilizer you need to grow.
But, your poem makes me wonder if that really was a “funny” thing to stay to a strugging student. Thanks a lot!!! 🙂
I think my students would find the idea of an assignment as fertilizer funny…given that so many of them know fertilizer as manure. They would have figured it as a way to make commentary on the assignment. I like the idea of thinking about students as trees or flowers…things that grow and flower in spite of things around them.
Melanie, as a fellow pollen sufferer, I totally am with you on the love hate relationship with the gorgeous blooming trees everywhere. My own worst of the bunch pollen is with forsythia which I adore, the first promise of spring for us all which sends me for tissues and an inhaler! Your line, ” this reckless insistence on becoming despite the suffering it causes,” sums up the strong power of living things to persist and continue even if some/many are blowing and sneezing away. Thanks, this was wonderful.
Mafily Tree
Mafily tree,
from birth your branches nourished me.
with each breeze your leaves rustled wisdom,
your rings hold generations of love,
your bark protects my future.
as I grow, you grow.
we are rooted for eternity.
My son’s sons shall read your moss,
as I see my greatest father in the your highest burl and in your deepest root.
No matter my faults or my gains,
your my tree,
until moons no longer
remain.
Clayton, your poem reminds me of the term we often hear “family tree” and challenges me to wonder if I’m a protective or nourishing tree. Reading Melanie;s poem adds to that wonder@
Your poem, however, has positive connotations of the blessing we may be to students we’ve taught who may not have “appreciated” us during their time of growth, but now see that we really were teaching them something that later protected them from being misled, because of what they have read! Or how they learn to “interpret” what they read and recognize how their writing also carries a “message.”
Clayton, I needed a minute as well as Google AI to be sure there really wasn’t some real tree supporting your family. This really is creative and a wonderful ode to enduring family love and ties.
Erica, your prompt could produce many poems today as when I stop to think about it, trees really do play a significant role in the way we interact with our environment. Your line about the “guardians of the honeysuckle twining the fence and a trio of little girls brewing potions,” spurred my own memory of a few years when an old apple tree graced our yard when we moved to a house.
We were excited to pick apples,
Instead, we, picked Poison Ivy.
We were thrilled with the tree fort,
Instead, the branch gave in to our weight.
We set up the tent in her shade, played checkers,
Instead. oblivious to the cancer causing chemicals in that
Old apple tree in the orchard, lost to suburban bloom.
What I love about this poem is the story that is so deeply embedded in each line. You described what you tried to do and how you were defeated. The apple tree/picking apples imagery reminded me so much of my childhood. I cannot tell you how many times poison ivy was a part of what I picked! Thank you for the poem!
Anita, today, the poems are reminding me of metaphors to life, and you suggest that all that looks good is not good! Apples, we may recall, are among the most nutritious, but they are the “fruit” that, according to Biblical Scripture, caused the “fall of Man” because he believed a Woman. Oh my, how far your poem has extended this image! But alas, the tree did not remain, and those who believe in the Word of God believe that the coming of the “Savior” can rid the world of other attractive, tasty things that may harm humans.
Oh well, this is Sunday, and I tend “to read” into writing what I may have heard in church that day.
Thanks for sharing your poem and understanding the stance of my comments. Bless you.
Anna, thank you for seeing between the lines at my sadness for the many who played under that tree impacted by cancer. The lure of the apples/tree followed by years of sadness and illness is what I was trying to convey in a very real world example of the lure of the fruit/tree despite its risks.
Erica, I loved your loblolly poem! What a fun name for the tree, and I had to look up the ice cream place. 🙂
My tree poem took a bit of a turn, but it’s still rooted in a tree story. 😉 Also I used a weird, cool form for this called an “ae freislighe” — an Irish quatrain poem.
Flight
This home became our adoptee
2009, a wet July.
Surprised by neighbors (chickadees),
suburban happiness belied.
When you were wee, a whippersnap
Those maples, three, were tiny, too
And as you matured, chipper lass –
Those maples, liney, grew.
They marked each year of your young life
As branch invited feathered friends.
Your years invited unsung strife
And, yet, you weathered them.
And now those trees: how tall they’ve grown!
They shelter avian families.
The years have passed, my birds near flown
from family home and shelt’ring trees.
Wendy, your poem has me welling up in those tears that come from watching our little ones grow that parallels the lives of our trees a you so wonderfully describe. “They mark each year,” is really a powerful thought that reminds me of pine saplings we planted thinking they might be Christmas trees someday. We could not find the heart to cut them down!
I love the parallet lives described here. The linking of images, the layering and connections–beautiful. So beautiful.
Wendy, I’m so impressed you try new and cool forms! Love the image of the trees and then the expansion to your young ones flying the nest. Beautiful thoughts and poem today.
My daughter (who also loves poetry) and my wife (who doesn’t share that particular interest) have been lounging outside surrounded by trees. Perfect. I’ll come back later and read and write something,
my neighbor has no
idea I long to watch
his red maple blaze
Mo, it’s great that we don’t need neighbor’s permission to do some things like “watch his red maple blaze.” I love maple tree leaves in the fall. They are so beautiful.
Mo, nice haiku! That last line was lovely.
Mo, I USED to love a magnificent sycamore whose magnificent branches hung gracefully in my neighbor’s yard harboring more bords, squirrels and years than I can even imagine. Then, last summer, it was gone after a storm cleaned it up and the home owners grew scared. I miss it big time.
Thank you for the prompt, Erica! I know the pines, and I heard the word “loblolly,” but I just realized that a pine-tree that grew out of seed in my backyard is a loblolly pine. I like how these trees are “guardians of the honeysuckle twining the fence / and a trio of little girls brewing potions.” For me, the childhood tree is certainly a mulberry, but I already wrote quite a bit about it.
Here in Louisiana, I love old oaks. Our university alone has 148 oak trees on its property, and we have a tree that maybe a bit over hundred years in our backyard. When I read the prompt, I thought about oaks and magnolias; both are very prominent in Louisiana. Then , I remembered W. Whitman’s poem I Saw in Louisiana Live Oak Growing, and thought what if I write a poem from the tree’s point of view in response to Whitman. I wasn’t sure where it’d take me. I am attaching my poem here, but it’s best to read the poems side by side, so see the image, please.
The Live Oak’s Song
by Leilya Pitre
When I stand here by myself,
moss hanging from my branches
and dark-green leaves uttering joy
as the wind carries its song through me,
I see Louisiana stretching around me—
sugar cane rising tall in the heat,
strawberry fields reddening near the earth,
white egrets lifting over flooded ditches,
brown pelicans circling toward the coast.
I do not feel alone.
I see people moving through these fields
before the morning fully wakes,
tending the cane, the soil, the seasons,
hands roughened by work and weather,
voices carrying across open land.
I don’t feel alone
And when storms tear through this land
and floodwaters swallow the roads,
I see neighbors becoming brothers,
boats crossing dark water,
arms lifting strangers to safety,
gathering broken pieces of home.
How could I feel alone
standing in a land
where even sorrow is carried together?
I stand by myself, but never alone.
Leilya, I have not been in Louisiana in many years, yet you bring me right back to images of my childhood. Your lines, :When I stand here by myself, moss hanging from my branches and dark-green leaves uttering joy as the wind carries its song through me,” I am not alone is powerful. I remember the sun flickering through the moss as it set at night. Thanks for the memories
I love the repetition of never feeling alone–that line gets more and more powerful each time you repeat it. Some of the tree/moss imagery is so familiar to me because of coastal Georgia trees. Love this!
Leilya, I’m loving the attitude and heart in the Live Oak’s Song in response to Whitman. I love the title, and how it conjures Whitman’s famous poem for me. The oak sings her own “Song of Myself.” Lovely.
Erica, thanks for this prompt to share I poem included in recently published anthology:
TREES AND ME
Whenever I see a tree,
I wonder how it’s related to me.
After reading Native American authors,
Who share compelling stories about
The interrelatedness of nature,
I’ve come to believe it’s true.
Say Redwood Tree, in the Sequoias, you still look great!
Were you here as our ancestors crossed the Bering Strait?
Say Angel Oak Trees on Geechee Islands
Did my great-grandparents play under you?
Hey, Dutch Elms along our Motown Street,
That’s where we pre-teens used to meet
To play hopscotch when we were young.
And sip pilfered booze when we were not
But teens and thought we were so hot!
Doing the twist in the mist to the
Four Tops songs being sung.
Hey, Palm Trees on Southern-Cal beaches.
I never knew how you could drink
When there was no rain,
But then, I remember, you’re Created by God
He designed it so you can survive in dry sod.
So, yes, I guess we are related, ‘cause
He also created me.
I’m so glad we all can co-exist,
Our Creator, thee, and me.
Anna, I like the idea to look at the trees and think about how it’s related to you. Your poem reminds me how connected we are to nature that surrounds us, but also shapes our experiences and memories.
Anna, this was so great! Love the pictures you create of those trees throughout the year, and that last stanza was sweet and elegant, an apt closing.
I love the serenity and wonder embedded in your poem. The idea of connection to nature threads through every stanza. Love this!
Erica, thank you! I have a busy day today. The baby in my poem is flying in today, with her baby, so sometime soon I’ll write more about a tree I do know about. The Loblolly pine and Loblolly Creamery sound wonderful, and I love how they are both twined up in your poem, like the honeysuckle and trees of your pawpaw’s yard.
It was a generation ago
that we thought it would be
fun to take our one-month-old
on a camping adventure.
We filled our pickup
with all the paraphernalia
an infant needs.
We set up her porta-crib
in our six-person tent,
baby carrier, bike trailer,
and all the small things
only a babe needs.
It was early summer
in northwest Iowa
and it was already hot.
The mosquitos were thick
and the cottonwoods were shedding
their eponymic balls of fluff.
The humid air’s snowflakes
stuck to our daughter’s
sweaty brow and cheeks.
After one sweltering night,
we went home,
and today the vulnerable image
of her reminds me
of all I don’t know
about the trees,
and babies,
and losses,
and near misses,
and all the joy and risk
of being alive and just doing my best.
Thanks for this quick poem Denise. I loved the words I learned while reading it and cannot imagine even attempting to take a baby camping!
I love how nature sets the scene and the way the objects infest rather than mosquitoes or balls of fluff that kiss the sweaty brow. And then how that image of parents sharing their baby with nature remains. How nature knows enough for parents sometimes and holds space for memories.
All the joy and risk…so true…
Denise,
Time flies and children grow so quickly. One of my two daughters is finishing her undergraduate course and the other, her first year at university. Fortunately, I have a son still in high school. He has grown as tall as a sequoia in just a few months after having shed his chubbiness. Memories of them growing abound and your poem helped me to visit the times when my wife and I would load the car with “paraphernalia of infant needs” to go visit relatives or spend time out. I love the way you have captured the ‘vulnerable image’ of your baby. The image of the cottonwoods’ “eponymic balls of fluff” and how they become the ‘humid air’s snowflakes” really did it for me. This, and the raw emotions, in your poem, are exactly what I love to linger on when I read poetry. Thank you so much for sharing.
Denise, what a story to remember! Sometimes, adventures turn into a mini-odyssey, but they remain memorable. Your rich descriptions allow me to imagine the setting. I am almost itching sensing the mosquitos around. Your final lines are reflective and, while I have different life experiences, they are so relevant to me as well.
Denise,
Wow!
(After line 4, I said, to myself, “Uh-oh…” — so good job dropping some foreshadowing there with your tone and line breaks. XD)
Those last few lines! How I can relate to that sentiment. And loved the imagery of the cottonwoods shedding their leaves and sticking to your “daughter’s/sweaty brow and cheeks.” As parents who took our little ones camping at a young age (I can remember one trip to a campsite where they put us next to a dumpster with a huge “Beware of Bears” sign near it….in a tent…with a toddler in poopy diapers…), this poem was so relatable, funny, tender, and forgiving of ourselves as we “just [do] our best.”
Thank you, Erica, for hosting us today. I’m grateful to continue thinking about places to visit when I retire. I am offering a haiku because time is short today. I’m visiting Bloom Ranch for Jazz and Brunch. It’s about 90 minutes away and I’ve never been there before! Yay!
Giant Sequoias
Tallest living things on earth
California’s trees
©Stacey L. Joy, 5/17/26
What a great haiku, Stacey. To be reminded that they are the tallest living things on earth is so lovely. They are some long living ones too. I like that last line too. I hear your pride. Enjoy your day!
Stacey, your poem reminds me of my morning – – visiting my brother, I took my camera out to identify a tree. It gave two options: Sequoia tree or Juniper. I chuckled.. …a giant Sequoia right there in North Carolina by Lake Hickory would be quite a thing to see, so we concluded it was a juniper. And then to see your poem on the Sequoias has me wanting to visit the place where I really can see them out west. I hope you have a great day at Bloom Ranch and find the groove in the jazz and the brunch. Love the haiku today!
A quick and beautiful haiku celebrating California’s trees will do just nicely! Thank you.
Love all the poems of never been there before that are stirring, maybe for your new book of poems. Tallest living things on earth. I mean. Wow.
Often I feel grateful that the haiku was invented. They capture so much in a mere 17 syllables. The one you penned is no exception. The tight second line is a strong reminder that all living things on earth are somehow connected, the ones that scrape the sky and the tiny ones that have to compete with the giants for the nourishing rays of the sun.
Stacey, congratulations on your retirement! Enjoy your outing. I love sequoias–they are so magestic!
I love haiku in general so I am delighted when I see them posted. I have never seen these trees so this poem feels so inspriational.
Erica—thank you for the prompt and your poem. I loved the image of the seeds reaching the stars and returning as moon trees. At first, I struggled to get started—I’m not much of a tree person— but then I remembered the maple trees in the front yard in my childhood home in upstate New York, and the memories flooded back. I had never tasted anything other than genuine maple syrup until I went to college. It was a rude awakening!
Tapping the Trees
You take things for granted when you are growing up.
assuming that everyone shares the same experiences,
that there is a universal set of facts for all to know.
Only later do you realize the fallacy of that belief.
Every March, when the ice in the lake began to thaw
and the drifts became indistinguishable grey lumps,
my grandfather would tap the two immense maple trees
flanking our driveway.
The weather had to be right—
nights in the twenties and daytimes in the forties.
The tin sap buckets seemed to appear miraculously,
hanging on the south side of the massive trees—
two tin-roofed buckets, gathering amber gold.
It takes forty gallons of sap to make one gallon of syrup.
My grandfather would boil down the sap for hours
until the sap thickened into syrup.
I believed everyone had magical trees
in their front yard offering
sweet amber blessings just for me.
I was wrong about that,
as I was about so many things.
These days, I douse my pancakes
with a poor imitation of maple syrup from a plastic bottle.
I think of those majestic maple trees
and the joy I took for granted.
Gayle Sands
5/17/26
Oh, Gayle. “I believed everyone had magical trees.” That line. That line.
Gayle — Nothing compares to real Maple Syrup. Your images of the “tin sap buckets” and “sweet amber blessings” reminded me of when my kids were little, andwe would take them to our Metro Parks to watch the maple tapping and to enjoy pancakes with syrup on crisp mornings. Those trees truly are “magical trees.”
Oh, Gayle, this poem saturates my heart with all the syrupy sweetness of growing up believing that everyone had the magical trees that make pancakes the best they can be. Your poem brings to mind our loop through New England when NCTE was in Boston and staying at an inn in Woodstock where they made the maple syrup in the backyard from trees growing in the backyard. I was completely smitten with the whole place and the lady who has run that breakfast place and cooked there for years – – and to see that you had this experience of local maple syrup made by your own grandfather is cause for my heart to celebrate today. I grew up on crab and fish fresh-caught off the pier in the village on an island in Georgia and had no idea that fresh seafood is not the norm for everyone, so I can see the way the joy gets sapped when I think about freezer-to-oven fish sticks. You remind us to be appreciative of everything and take nothing for granted.
Like Sarah, I too love the line about magical trees. I may not have had maple producing trees, but every house I have lived in has had a corresponding tree. This line resonates with me.
Gayle,
This is such a beautifully crafted poem, from beginning to end. I like how you begin with childhood assumptions about the a ‘universal sets of facts” and “realiz[ing] the fallacy of that belief” and later in life “dousing pancakes with a poor imitation of maple syrup from a plastic bottle”. And in between, you so beautifully show the process of maple syrup making.
Gayle, thank you for sharing this precious memory of collecting maple sap and boiling it down to the syrup. There are maple trees in Crimea, but I never saw anyone collecting sap. that line about ‘magical trees” is haunting as I, too, had some childhood assumptions about miracles.
Gayle, I love your poem about maple syrup trees. Oh, my goodness, the magic. I have never seen that, except in those old reel films we used to watch in elementary school, and you can bet, I was thinking that tree was magical and wishing I had one in sunny southern California. “sweet amber blessings” So lovely.
Gayle, we also tapped maple trees – one of my favorite passages of time from spring childhoods. I cannot bring myself to eat the “motor oil,” as we call it from plastic bottles. You’ve brought so many memories back for me – the hours of boiling, the tin-roofed buckets, the gathering. Truly a time long passed.
Erica,Thank you for this prompt ~ I love writing about trees— and I need to learn more about the LoblollyI am traveling today and am not sure I will get write something so I’ve pulled out an earlier poem about a tree in Chernobyl (which I mentioned in yesterday’s post).
The Pine Tree
Chornobyl, Ukraine
So green was the forest
of my birth! At my feet,
fresh moss,
lacey-leaved wormwood,
and fragile shoots
even smaller than me.
Virescent elders tall enough
to touch the sky promised
I too,
would be ever green
and someday tall as they.
But a great hissing
brought clouds of dust
and sudden death.
Red rings choked us
and changed our
our evergreen branches
to bitter, reddened,
spikes of wood.
Bulldozed and buried
9 feet below ground,
covered
with a shroud of sand,
we remain excluded from life—
forever denied
heaven’s unblemished blue.
Ann,
These lines -‘
“we remain excluded from life—
forever denied
heaven’s unblemished blue” – really struck me. If feels like the world has forgotten the devastation and lasting environmental impact caused by Chornobyl. Humans have been careless stewards of our planet. It makes me sad.
Ann, your poem is haunting and has me thinking of all the ways we bury the past. So much to love here and to think about. Human hands and hearts harden promises and hope. But human hands write beautiful poetry, too, as yours today.
The last line hits home — that denial of the blue skies! I also love how you contrast both the small and grand nature of trees in different stages of growth before the destruction. Amazing
Ooof! This is a tough poem to read. I am so sad about the buried trees of Ukraine. I love that last line “heaven’s unblemished blue”.
In Praise of Olive Tree
Olive trees in Orvieto are
not crops; they are landscape’s
memory. Shaped by centuries
of farming, most groves mix
leccino, pendolino, each fruit a
profile of soil, oil hung in weeping
clusters. Shallow roots spread wide,
grip rocks, weather drought;
twisted trunks hallowing with age.
Olive trees in Orvieto don’t grow neat-
ly, irregular shape is their biology,
evidence of resilience. Inherited
groves get split among heirs; still
albero del nonno witnesses rivalries.
Generations of dissent prune wounds;
even split trunks survive to regrow. And
inside twists, between injuries weathered,
cycles of damage show a living
archive of a life standing longer
in the hills of Orvieto.
I found in your poem, not only a portrait of the olive tree, but of families, forgiveness, growing and nourishing despite all the weathering. I love “landscape’s memory” and “even split trunks survive to regrow.”
First I loved one line, then another. Then another! But I love “oil hung in weeping clusters” the most, I think!
Sarah,
I love so many of these images, especially “each fruit a/profile of soil, oil hung in weeping” and “twisted trunks hallowing with age”. Your images ared not only beautiful but they make the trees feel alive.
Sarah, your poem brings to mind the strength of generations of families who are one with the flora of the area, even as it Is used in their landscape and food. It’s more than a symbol, it is part of an entire cultural identity, and I love these lines so much:
Generations of dissent prune wounds;
even split trunks survive to regrow.
There is much in this symbolic splitting and dissent that carries messages for today, as we hope for new ways to bloom despite all the suffering of the past. Despite what generations before us have all cultivated in their own mindsets. I think olives have the power to do that – – I’m thinking of the olive oil for lamps and cooking, the light to see the way and the food to give us strength for the journey.
Sarah, the beginning of your poem capture my attention and makes me think of generations of people with rich “landscape’s memory.” I think about families depending on farming, spending most of the time tending to crops.
Another fascinating thing in your poem is the line breaks, particularly here:
“Olive trees in Orvieto don’t grow neat-
ly, irregular shape is their biology”
It is so clever to make an “irregular” line break when you talk about the olive trees that “don’t grow neatly”–you are visually representing this phenomenon. and did I mention how beautiful it sounds “Olive trees in Orvieto” – alliteration and assonance at the same time. So cool!
Sarah, wow, you have learned so much about the Orvieto olive trees. And you tell us about them so richly and poetically. I can visualize these trees hanging onto life:
And leaving that “oil hung in weeping” at the end of that line is perfect.
An amazing poem of place. Orvieto is a word that is poetic and easy to imagine with your descriptive verse. I also admire your skill at enjambment in this poem.
Thank you, Erica! Yes, I would love to write about a tree today, a tree I fought to call my own many years ago. Your loblolly pine and the “sticky sweet whimsy” inspired me.
PawPaw
When I was eight years old,
I argued with my best friend,
Mary Ann.
She lived next door,
her bedroom window
just across the hedge
from my bedroom window.
On summer nights,
we talked to each other
through the screens,
elbows propped on window sills,
so close we needed only
to whisper.
Our first fight…
who owned the pawpaw tree
that grew smack dab
in the middle of our backyards,
half its limbs drooping over
the little freshwater spring that
burbled up at the base of the hill
behind my house,
half its limbs dropping fruit
on a patch of vines
that tangled on the slope
behind her swing set.
“Those are my pawpaws,” she said.
“Nope, they’re mine,” I said.
And back and forth we went
while carrying armfuls of
sweet fruit, gently shaken
from low-hanging limbs.
We trudged, laden with
palm-sized, pale green
treasures,
up the hill,
laying our harvest in rows
to ripen
on my front stoop.
Still arguing, hours later,
we sat, side by side,
on her covered front porch.
Rain dripped off the eaves.
Thunder rumbled.
We tore into the sun-warmed
flesh of the pawpaws
with our fingernails,
biting into the tropical mush,
mangobananapineapple-ish
delish.
No wonder we wanted to
lay claim.
Finally, though,
our fingers sticky,
our bellies full,
we agreed to
share that fancy tree
and her fruit that tasted
of far-off islands and sea breezes…
so out of place
in our mountain home,
yet right
smack dab
where she belonged.
Love this narrative poem, and I feel it is also a lovely topic for a picturebook, in the way that there are layers of lessons here of friendship and the nourishment that trees offer and the way that fruits and heritage and belonging are really not so rooted, are they?
Lori,
Your verse poem conveys a strong sense of place and friendship.
Love these lines– “our fingers sticky,
our bellies full,
we agreed to
share that fancy tree.”
Lori, I can feel the breeze coming through the windows as curtains billow and best friends talk through the screens – – that is an image to paint, and if I were a famous artist or even one with talent and could paint what I see, that’s the one I’d be painting today. I see braids, I see overalls, I see Holly Hobby quilts on beds, and rag dolls of our day. What a treat to read your poetry – – you have a gift of conjuring the past and bringing us into it with you. The sweetness of friendship, despite its prickly parts of the fruit, is front and center here as I think back to the days of best friends who lived close enough to love and spar with once in a while over nothing…..and realize our human flaws in the mirror. This has so much depth that I just want to read it again and again.
I love this story of you and your friend. I can visualize the whole scene. I’ve known grown ups who have argued about a tree and had to get the law involved. I thought that was ridiculous. None of us truly owns any tree.
Lori, there is a tactile depth to your poem in all the specifics of rain dripping and flesh under fingernails. I can imagine the need to lay claim to such a wonderful treat (I’ve often wondered what pawpaws taste like and now I’m even more determined to try one!). I love the whispering through screens on warm summer nights. That’s even more sweet than the pawpaws!
Thank you for hosting us today, Erica! My heart holds loblollies lovingly in memory, for they were the trees recently harvested from the farm, and now ours don’t even get to be ice cream, they have to be telephone poles. I love how you inspired us to pay tribute to trees today. My poem isn’t a tree, but a fern – – at least it is in the plant family. I recently brought home a fern inside a concrete turtle. My mother loved ferns, and my dog I recently had to lay to rest had two little green turtle toys that were his favorite toys.
To My New Turtle Fern
Fern: from 322 Magnolia Avenue in a concrete turtle planter
Everything about you
Reminds me of Mom – and Fitz, who
Never met a turtle he didn’t like
I love the how the juxtaposition of turtles and ferns created such a fresh and precious tribute.
Oh, your farm, Kim. Harvested. That word has layers of meaning. The fern feels like it was wanting some time and space in the poetry world, and the way the fern is for grieving just struck me here in your poem. A memorial gesture, a comfort, a condolence. But the tie to turtle is really the part that carries grief for me here. The connection in naming. The sweet Fritz, a new turlte fern, a new seeing of the turtle fern in this elegy to a tree, a fern. Yes.
I love the many things the fern represents for you and how fitting to use an acrostic style to fit them all!
Kim, ferns look so gentle and fragile much like our ties to those close. I know Fitz would love your new concrete turtle nestled with a fern. The permanence of the concrete marks the long-lasting effect he will have in your life and the fern acknowledges the new beginnings he would wish for you. Hugs.
I love the sound of Loblolly. I grew up surrounded by tall pines. I’m almost positive that my best tree free was a loblolly when I was a child. I often write about the old grandmother oak in my yard; however, today I chose to write about the magnolia, the state tree for both of my home states Mississippi and Louisiana. My neighbor has one in full bloom. I am nurturing a baby one I found.
Magnolia Mindfulness
Morning glow sets these large white blossoms
to solicitous scent, fragrance envy of any perfumer.
I breathe in her endurance, feel the ground beneath
and cock my head to the sky in praise
of her popularity (her name is on every bakery, nail salon, and street
from Louisiana to Mississippi.)
Bless me with your endurance, sweet Magnolia,
give me a taste of the divine.
Margaret this is a wonderful tribute the Magnolia who only visits my New York yard for a short time but whose loveliness always cheers me and gives me a taste the divine… just perfect!
Awwww, you’re nurturing a baby Magnolia. Of course, you are. I love seeing you do that in my mind. }That scent! Yes. And yes to the name that spreads far and wide…beauty is what beauty does.
Magnolias are so beautiful! I love how you address the tree in your last two lines. I hope your baby magnolia flourishes under your care.
Oh, magnolia. I can’t really think of that flower without thinking of the movie. Steel. And I hear that in your poem. “I breathe in her endurance” and then your naming of the popularity in the bakery, salon, street does tell other stories of staying. Sweet. Strong. Love that last line. Clever.
Oh, that steel magnolia tree that can offer a taste of the divine – – your last line brings me to my knees in want of this kind of tree wisdom. Nothing exudes southern charm quite like a magnolia in the world of trees, and I feel the roots of place and family strongly here.
Love this tribute to the magnolia! I love how the last line comes across like a prayer
Magnolias have always captivated me – their flowers seem both delicate and strong. I can only imagine how beautiful they would be in the morning glow. I especially love the breathing in of her endurance while feeling the ground below her. This places me there with you.
I love how your prompt forced me to take closer not of the beloved gingko tree in our backyard. We planted it in tribute when my father passed away.
Mrs. G
she’s much older
than her appearance
divulges,
her ancestry
reaching back
millions and
millions of years
her regal beauty,
her alert
sophistication,
a stark contrast
to the droop of
the neighboring
willow.
her girlish figure
grows up
more than out
yet there is
an appealing
curvaceousness
that is rare.
her strong
yet delicate limbs
move languidly
and with gentleness
in the wind.
she boldly sheds
her golden dress in
one day,
leaving herself
vulnerably exposed
but her survivor
will leaves
no doubt
that she will be
just fine.
~Susan Ahlbrand
17 May 2026
Oh! How beautiful. I’ve always loved ginkgo trees. I love how this tree has heritage and girlishness.
The gingko is my absolute favorite in fall…since yellow is my favorite color! I love how you describe her “girlish figure” and her “regal beauty” and how she “boldly sheds her golden dress.”
Her survivor will leaves no doubt that she will be just fine…..oh, the strength I feel here, the legacy, the lingering – – a strong presence. I particularly love the contrast to the weeping willow and this drew a vivid image in my mind:
her strong
yet delicate limbs
move languidly
and with gentleness
in the wind.
I am there. I see this tree, feel I know its tenacity and quiet strength, and the faces of strong women come to life in its trunk. I love a Gingko tree and how it brings to mind the ageless wisdom I can feel here. Beautiful, Susan!
A wonderful description of the ginkgo tree, “”her girlish figure…curvaceous” And then her golden dress. You’ve managed to carry through the metaphor from the very beginning.
Susan, a beautiful choice of tree to honor of loved one. The leaves have always fascinated me. I feel your connection to the tree, especially in that last stanza when you acknowledge she will be just fine after such a significant loss. What a powerful way to draw real life into the poem.
Loblolly is such a fun word to say. They don’t grow here in Michigan, at least I’ve never seen one here. I love the journey you describe of their seeds – touching stars and returning as moon trees – telling of the scattering. Trees have touched my life in many ways (we maple syruped, sold Christmas trees, felled and milled and planed).
Centurion
It held our swing
within arms
stretched far and wide
enough
to swing full circle
and never touch the trunk.
It marked the boundary
between backyard
and woods,
matriarchal,
gathering its children close,
patriarchal,
seeding acres.
It towered over the house
and land,
a silent sentinel
feeding squirrels,
housing birds,
offering shade
until one day it didn’t.
One strike
blew the bark
clean off,
covering the grass
in ugly confetti,
split the trunk in three.
We read its diary
in counted rings,
looked at drought years
and rapid growing years,
living witness to the dark scars
of history.
I wasn’t expecting the storm. “One strike…” I love “ugly confetti” and “read its diary”. I am sorry you lost this special tree.
I love this Jennifer…I love how you read its diary in counted rings…I have long been writing tree poems and gathering into a WIP called WITNESS. These trees that gather children close and housing birds have so many secrets to share!
Oh, I love this tree. Those old swings on ropes were tough to stay on and yet gave so much freedom! What a thoughtful tree to keep a diary for you to read later after tragedy struck.
Oh! That lightning strike was a gut punch! I love the line: “We read its diary.” It’s amazing how trees become favorites and stake claim on childhood memories…and you’ve captured that phenomenon perfectly.
Jennifer, swinging full circle without touching the trunk shows the expanse of this tree, and I can feel its shade and the rocking comfort of the swing. There isn’t much that is more comforting in all this world than the weightlessness of a tree swing – and to end on the dark scars of history as it bears witness to the atrocities and still loves people anyway is a testament to the loyalty of trees to love humans and embrace and hold us up. Wow, just wow!
Gosh, Jennifer, how do you make a poem about a dang tree so touching? I love how you hit on both matriarchal and patriarchal traits. And then the strike! Gosh . . . heartbreaking. I love how you have the rings as a diary, showing what happened over the years.
is flat powerful
Erica! I love your energy filled bio. What a writing champion. Thanks for being here today. I went to my journal to brainstorm about trees and ended up writing about a ring…which is weird and fun and what called to me this morning. Thanks!
I’m intrigued with loblolly. I had to go look up pictures.I can imagine sisters playing with the needles. Fun times!
Mother’s jewelry box
source of fascination
for my sister and I
So many pretty little necklaces
and pins from her childhood.
Her dogwood flower ring,
fit my little girl finger just right.
Even though we lived
in a place of freezing silver maples,
I daydreamed of warm, a petal pink
palace of Dogwood trees
to call my own.
Linda, I can picture that tiny flower ring encircling your finger and the two of you exploring the jewelry box. It took me back to an exact moment in my mother’s room where so many treasures nestled in boxes of their own. Dogwoods are a favorite. The woods of our second home were lined with them. I haven’t been able to recreate what nature did so beautifully.
I grew up with dogwood trees. I can imagine the ring you remember. My father wanted to grow one so bad, but they are particular about lighting. I loved traveling to Mississippi just to see the dogwoods in bloom.
Linda, the juxtaposition of the freezing silver maples with the petal pink palace of dogwood trees is stunning…
Linda, I love where this prompt took you…and where it took all of us who have the chance to read about this precious memory. When you connected the “freezing silver maples” of your home to the “petal pink palace of Dogwood trees,” your girlhood imaginings came to life. Magical!
Being a girl and exploring jewelry boxes is such a fun memory to pull from for this — especially with the detail of the Dogwood ring! I love that imagery and snapshot of an experience.
We have two American Ash in our yard, and they are both a bee’s paradise right now.
Kevin
American Ash,
I know this can’t last,
but you’re such a burst
of white flower in bloom,
like the door’s been opened
and these bees have wandered
into the room
Kevin, how lucky you are to have ash that survived the emerald borer. You capture both the simplicity and complexity of nature in spring’s opening door and the interdependence necessary for future seasons so beautifully.
Room for bees is such a wonderful image. We need those rooms more and more.
Lovely…this poem allows the reader to wander in as well.
Kevin, I couldn’t resist Googling the American Ash in bloom…and wow! I can just imagine the bees having their glorious day amongst the white flowers. Thank you for focusing on this tree today!