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I had a love affair with a tree once
couldn’t take it with me

had to let it go—
you know—
with the house

but each year as spring approaches…
my thoughts wander back
to white blossoms and filtered sunlight
and I want to ask
are you okay?
are they treating you well?
do they appreciate you?
the way I did, I mean

and I wish I could stand next to you
feel you
reach up and pick that first exquisite plum of the season
bite through your purple skin
into your burgundy flesh
and
letting the juice run down my chin
feel that explosion of sweet-tart bliss

you kept me in the kitchen
six weeks each hot July
dealing with your abundance
canning chutneys and jellies and jams
putting up pricked plums in light honey syrup
sweat dripping down my face and under my arms
taking basketfuls to Mary McAnena
for the homeless at Hart Park

one morning of one year
after weeks of hot canning
strolling out to find your still-profligate branches
had dropped bushelfuls of ripe satsumas
I stood beneath you
threw up my hands and pleaded
“Stop! Stop!”

the next summer
the meagerest of harvests
chastised, I never did that again

seventeen years we lived and danced together
seventeen years nurtured each other
such love
such love
it must’ve been our love that made your plums
so succulently sweet

The way is over deeded land
The act is quiet
Boots, walking stick
A meadow, a gravel road
A path slanting into the woods
Dark, wild, familiar
I have been here before
This is supposed to do something to me
But what?
Make the problems go away?
Turn back the tide of time?
Restore innocence?
The path is not long
The woods chaotic and still
Until the path falls into the river
Five hues darker than the sky
The water clear and opaque simultaneously
Fluid patterns fleeting as thoughts
And I see why I have come

Much too busy
For this shizzy.

Is there an etiquette to memories,
Some required permission, for me
To be in yours and you in mine?
I would be pleased to introduce you
To my recollections, my fellow travelers,
Sensitive to time and landscape
With explanations of when and why
I invited you to this particular
Historical rendition, seen through
The lenses of years and years of
Nuanced dialogues to shape
Dissident decades’ influence
On my narrative truth.

There are those
Who only know
Love by heresay
Other’s looks
Other’s words
Insurmountable
Somehow distant
Insufficient
Little better
Than whispers
Little better
Than loneliness