March 2018 | THE WISDOM OF TREES

Since I was a child, I have always been drawn to trees (see poem below.) Diana Beresford-Kroeger is a botanist, microbiologist, and preserver of trees, who reveals some of trees’ many astonishing properties with wisdom, passion, and an unrivaled knowledge of their vital and irreplaceable value to us and to Earth. Diana also offers us ways to contribute to the trees’ wellbeing in our humble lives, as does Claire Dubois, founder of TreeSisters.org. I highly recommend a glorious, dynamic interview of Diana speaking with Clare at this link.

Diana Beresford-Kroeger has also written some wonderful books, and I find her DVD, CALL of the FOREST: the Forgotten Wisdom of Trees, profound and healing.

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Two friends from London responded to February’s Newsletter (you can see it at this link.) Lesley wrote: Thank you so much for posting the link to ROC’s documentary. It is so powerful. I have not had the joy of witnessing a nature spirit but I did experience, many decades ago, a complete merging with a tree. I was looking out at my beautiful, old garden – the first that I had had the joy of working in. I suddenly saw a figure crouched on a branch of the lilac tree. I felt it was me, and suddenly I melted into the tree. It was one of the most powerful physical sensations I have ever had. I felt the movement of transpiration pounding through the tree, drawing it up from the roots, through the trunk and out through the leaves. It was not an experience of hypersensitivity to the tree, it was as if I was totally immersed IN the tree. For many hours afterwards, with every tree that I looked at my ‘body’ flew to the very top of the trees. I have never taken drugs, so it was not a drug induced experience and there is no way that such a powerful physical experience could have been my ‘imagination’.

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We are currently accepting submissions of your Earth-Love experiences to be published in an upcoming issue. Perhaps, you could take 5 minutes to jot down one of your experiences or send a photo with a short commentary to this link. Thank you so much.

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Almuth shared this photo and experience. “There was a moment when walking on Wimbledon Common, when the light hit a puddle and made it into a circle of bright light.”

Rooted Night

                    I

I see him clear— skinny-ribbed, dark

curly hair— the dried out ditch

for a dare. He shinnies up a pine

higher, higher under the pelting sun

until thinning limbs sway and I worry

for him as his mother did. Yet he keeps

going and calls down in laughing peels,

Hey, look at me! I can see so far!

Now to climb down. Heart pumping,

he feels for toeholds while gripping

branches so slipping feet can burrow

in a fold— a shifting, temporary home.

He jumps the last few feet and lands

on the ground, brown eyes longingly

glance back. How far I’ve fallen

from that child’s heights!

                     II

But still he wings in me—love

of trees, life teeming all around,

that fecund wealth within—their quiet

power, rollicking waves of rhyme

sponged from his mother’s tongue,

the grief I feel for fallen friends—

the oak, the bay—brought down

by endless, whining teeth.

A thousandfold our bodies twine

with trees, trees’ spirit twinned

and breathing in our own― in sunlit

limbs, in somber silhouette,

in the spirited unseen women

and men who plumb the depths

of rooted night to water seeds

with light through open, pulsing hearts.
 

Raphael Block