At this point, I’d really rather be a tree because then I could just be
stuck, but free. I hear they spend no time at all
talking, ‘agendarising’,
And barely observe each other; bent skew, short, or tall. No really,
I’ve read this – No time at all. Isn’t it magical?
A magical thought! And you know what else would finally happen
if I were a tree?
The birds, they’d finally come to me! They’d sit on my branches; I’d look at them,
pecking at me. I’d see them, each cell,
as they nested with me – safe,
not knowing, never even thinking about what being there with me
could mean.
I’ve said ‘me’ a lot, but the bugs! oh the bugs also, would
crawl and tickle and munch –
the craziest haircuts they’d give!
I’d just BE there, feeling it all.
How pleasant, this daydream, meditation,
of being a tree.
I’ve just had a thought – A tree doesn’t move… And yet
the activity,
the daily bustle it must see. The things it must feel, like
when a storm comes or
fire breaths.
And yet the life I would live – so many 10s of years! So many more
than I could think of, now!
Oh I can’t help but think what
it would be
like to
be a tree.
Or a rock.
or dust on the breeze..
By Melissa Enslin
A South African who “part-times” in anything word or story related, gravitating to learning new skills all the time rather than sitting still in one’s job. Melissa writes to reach for the unheard voice – that of the earth, the dead, the soul. It is an attempt to live in memory of herself, to know she is always alive. Her poet voice is childlike, she is unapologetic about this. She wishes we each were more childlike. Trees are her wild because they are inviting to everything else, they do not react. They are bustling ecosystems that provide, endlessly, without interference.