Conversations with a Willow Tree

I decided
Sporadically
To join my friends in a trip to ‘field’
How understated and under-emotive
Our language can be
Shoes slide off and
Toes slide into
Wet, dewy, slick grass
My eyes glance to, flicker over
Then hold, catch, snared
Like a thread bare sweater on a jagged nail
I see them
A colony of swaying, frothing plants
Grasses, wheats, shrubs
Deep Greens, browns, pale lilacs
I spot them
Freckled, half moons, carved as if by a sickle
I know who she is-
Valerian
I hop and cry and cackle
I’ve been searching for you!
I laugh
Waggle my finger and
Search desperately for a strong stick
Sharpen her into a digging tool
I step delicately through the patch of high growing grasses
Floundering, try not to stab into a poking stick!
The perfect patch beseeches my vision and I fall to my knees
And dig dig dig
Her roots are spread through the ground
Tangled like knots
Bright white
The lurid aroma meets my nose and I love it
‘The smell of stinky feet’ says one source
I say, the earthly stench of mealy-sweet
Knuckle deep in wet mulch
Fire ants nipping at my heels
Red ankle welts
Finally my fingers trap, entrench,
And a stump of 5 valerian knots wrench themselves from the earth
I inhale her deeply
Brush errant dirt crumbles
Place pink clovers into the hole as a gift
Cover my tracks
I suddenly
From the corner of my eye
Spot the graceful, billowing willow
I’ve been searching for you, too!
I say
Glorious and glowing with excitement
Oh, the pain, the medicine, the tinctures I could make!
So I ask her
My friend, my mother, my guide and guardian
May I ask a favor?
May I have some of your bark, your skin, gray then green, dry then wet
To loosen my strains
To ease my pain
Oh mother, May I have some of your medicine?
Yet she continues her hum
Does not accept my question
Bending limbs and swaying trunk
Flittering leaves
I don’t feel that
Pull, that
Magnet of acceptance, calling me to take
and offering to give
No,
Go on she says
You’re not ready
Or perhaps I am not ready
To be cut
Skinned
No gift will have me change my mind
Child, you need to see what’s around you
Look at the wonderful day! The powerful sun!
Run, listen, cry
She quiets
I don’t like this answer
I’m angry, I say
Are you sure?!
A low hum of a nod
Fury pulls at my face
Why not?!
My thoughts explode
I’ve been searching and searching!
She points to the pond,
The echoes of bullfrogs
Deep, rocking, croaking
The color of lime ochre and
The fundus’ of hills and gentle slopes
Flowing hair of the earth
And so I sigh
Search for the noises around me
Feet planted in Pacha
Wiggle my toes
And then I RUN
Run out the anger
Run out the ego and the selfishness
Sprint to the top of one slope
Panting, shaking,
Take a moment to gawp at the view
And then I’m off and
Up to the next one
Spin spin spin at its tip
Spread my toes and fling out my arms
Flail like a child
With grace like a butterfly
Go on and on til
I’m falling
And sputter to the ground
Laughing and giggling and rolling in the grass
It is then I hear her calling again
Or perhaps vibrating
Long aching reaching roots
She tells me ‘I’m ready’
‘Come take my gift, my physical medicine’
I smile and tell her I have more to see first
A nod, an understanding
Now I know she has already given me more medicine than I could ever ask for
I spot flutters of white in the sky
Fairies in the baby blue canvas poking from fluff of cloud
And so,
Of course
I run to the mound of stalks that they emerge from
Floating, flying, trembling along the waves of breeze
Milkweed
Lovely mother of many
A positively quivering colony
Shaking with life and wind and birth
Seeds dispersing
The most buoyant,
With such gifts of flight
Our gaze floats to Willow Tree again
And I’m back up,
Fists of seeds in my hands
Released as I run to her
Blade out,
Gentle knicks
I take a thumbs worth of flexible bark on each limb
Green gray
Smelling of astringent and wood and earth
Scoop a muddle of mud
Mixed with the fluid, the water inside of me
(Spit, I must give some of me too)
I see my friends flounder and run down the same slopes
My heart is full and my gratitude runs bone deep