Handsome oak tree, one grand thread,

but split, split, split. Tangle of limbs,

cloud of leaves, your thread is

a network of veins; what is more

alive than you? What years have you

not known, and intimately:

their seasons have a particular ring

in your meticulous soul.

 

Unaware of my second nature

still you know how I plague a world

-it is in the air that sustains you-

you take to heart the crimes I'd rather hide.

 

You race to the heavens while

your roots dive incomparably deep.

I can only begin, even now

under your shelter, this portrait

in reparation; paper and pencil,

bench and shade all borrowed from thee.