A Year of Trees

On a morning dog walk, just at the changing of one season to another, I thought about how trees wear so many looks throughout the year, each look vying for the title of Most Beautiful. This poem began to form itself in my mind and I hurried to write it down as soon as I got home.

A Year of Trees

In winter

The sky plays background for graceful limbs

Bare of leaf and fruit

Showing off their strength and

Letting us know their structure

While evergreens,

shunning the comfortable nakedness of their cousins

Sleep fully clothed

A reminder of green

Then spring

And each day hosts a million births

Young blossoms flaunting every hue,

New leaves tender in delicate pastels,

A construction zone of nectoring bees and nesting birds

Awakening promises of green

Summer brings

The fullness of life

Trees pulse with sap

Fruit bulges from lengthened limbs

Songs of birds and toads fill days and evenings

A light in the nighttime canopy reveals
the eyes of small animals sheltering

Evergreens await winds to shake off dust and pollen

The green world fulfilling every promise

Until autumn

A glorious curtain call to celebrate another successful run

This last harrah brings flagrant demonstrations
of yellow, amber, and red
orange, purple and every type of brown

Nuts and persimmons dangle from baring limbs

Drifts of color coat every path and scatter in every wind

Soon the party colors will fade and

The trees of winter will dream the promises to come