Bloodlines
Bloodlines
by Holly Day
The maple sends its helicopter seeds across the yard
in desperation dreams of propagation. I rake most of them up
rip out the long roots of the ones that slip past me
take root and try to grow. I sometimes wonder
if my tree hates me, if it feels angry when it sees me
with my gardening shears clipping its offspring close to the ground
or if it’s resigned itself to the fact that it will never be surrounded
by a forest of its own family. I think of these violent acts of mine
during heavy storms when the limbs of the tree whips around my roof
if it’s using the wind and the lightning as an excuse to drop branches
and clumps of leaves on my lawn, if it’s aiming for me and my children
in an act of retaliation so sly it won’t ever be blamed.
I was just talking to someone the other day about veganism out of respect for not eating animals and I was like–“Yeah, who the hell am I to elevate animals over plants as a life-form…” I mean, plants are living too, and in this poem the tree is alive. I too often wonder what they might think or if they even do. Mankind landscapes the whole of nature it seems. We tailor suit it to our liking. At what cost?
Good read! Thanks for sharing!
Holly Day manages to get to the roots in her fine poetry.22