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Wake For An Alder Tree
Last night the Alder so deeply rooted in the hedgerow
was shot through by a bolt of climatic vulnerability.
I heard the smoking gun,
heard the clangorous salvo, the snap and break,
heard the unflexed crook of it pivot and shear,
timber dislocate, break, and crumble.
There was a fibrous unclasping,
then the unfolding thunder of impact.
This morning, thigh deep in its wreckage,
maneuvering through the downed foliage,
the strew of crumbled catkins,
I listen to its death throes
of leafage curling into whorl and lacuna,
the rustling whispers of a dwindling aftershock.
Splinters and twigs tremble, lumber creaks on
as a sotto voce rattle of demise
as if the tree was still collapsing beneath its fall,
as if this murmuring requiem
were a way to explain what the moment did.
Copyright ©
Eric Ashford
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