The soil is the tree’s ocean

Feel the strength of these tree roots in their autumn bed in a Croatian forest.

June 4th, 2009

I have returned from travels and visited the tree.

Winter has arrived, and it rains softly. I went barefoot to the tree and felt the flavour the ice has left in the ground – there has been frost while I was away. The soles of my feet delighted in the sharp cold as I trod on the stepping-stones through the garden bed, and then squatted by the tree. I heard the drip, drip of the rain and thought of it flowing in small currents along the twigs, to the branches, to the trunk, to the soil, just as the drains and runoffs and creeks in the earth flow into a river, and finally, the ocean. Here, the soil is the tree’s ocean, collecting all waters in its vastness.

I looked up and saw the bare hands of the tree, now that the leaves are all gone. Its long, thin fingers reach towards the sky, open, to receive the gifts of the sky God – the rains, the sun, the breezes that blow away dust and bring insects. I saw in these raised fingers the way the tree receives what is given: the good and the bad are received equally by the raised hands of the tree.