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From: Vol.06 N.02 – Intersecting Energies

All the Trees

by Susan Wardell

All the trees are pointing

away from earth. Promise

or ultimatum?

 

I should

eat dirt and plant myself.

That’s what they call ‘centred’.

I should

hold the hard truth of it

heavy in my belly.

 

I saw you before

you opened your eyes.

I didn’t want to apologise

then, but since

I sometimes wonder if

I should.

 

Till today when you climb

the old cherry behind the house, breathe

pink and infinite solutions,

however small. You invite me up.

I look skyward through its old, old arms

as you promise me

I won’t fall.

Published: July 2019
Susan Wardell

is from Dunedin, New Zealand, where she lectures in Social Anthropology at the University of Otago while raising two small humans and a few potted plants. She has been published in Landfall, Takahē, and Not Very Quiet. She placed second in the 2018 Landfall Essay Competition.

An Australian and international
journal of ecopoetry and ecopoetics.

Plumwood Mountain Journal is created on the unceded lands of the Gadigal and Wangal people of the Eora Nation. We pay our respects to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people, and to elders past, present and future. We also acknowledge all traditional custodians of the lands this journal reaches.

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