Trees are the primary reason I woke up this morning unable to breath out of one nostril. Trees are making my eyes itch so badly it takes all my willpower not to scratch them out of their sockets. Trees are why I look like a drug addict today with my red eyes and dark circles underneath. But I’m not hating.

There’s a critical scene in Annie Dillard’s Pilgrim at Tinker Creek that involves a tree. Everything becomes clear when she stumbles upon a certain tree, and that makes sense. Many important revelations have involved trees. The Buddha reached enlightenment under a Banyan tree. Newton understood gravity. Have you ever wondered why we call it “under-standing”? What is it we’re standing under? Probably a tree.

Trees

by Joyce Kilmer

 THINK that I shall never see

A poem lovely as a tree.

 

A tree whose hungry mouth is prest

Against the earth’s sweet flowing breast;

 

A tree that looks at God all day,

And lifts her leafy arms to pray;

 

A tree that may in Summer wear

A nest of robins in her hair;

 

Upon whose bosom snow has lain;

Who intimately lives with rain.

 

Poems are made by fools like me,

But only God can make a tree.