Lately I have been listening to trees...

Lately I have been listening to trees
Oh my. You have always been there, all along.
Been there for me and others.
How could I not have seen you for who you are? Heard your voice? Felt your pain or joy?
I remember walking a trail, alone, over several weeks.
Slowly and awkwardly, healing from a broken limb of my own.
Scared, very very cautious and timid.
But.
I was not really alone.
You were there on either side of me, arms reaching out protectively as a mother hovers over a newly walking toddler.
You with your brothers and sisters, parents and children, cousins.
Always there.
I sensed you, deep in my wounded but healing bone.
I heard you, but probably did not even acknowledge your presence or your voice, so focused on myself and my fears as I was.
I heard you encouraging me to take one step at a time, to take my time.
Urging me to stop for a moment to examine the milkweed and caterpillars, the emerging butterflies.
To listen to the bees as they flit among the flowers doing their important work.
Look down, you said. See that smooth gray stone with pink sparkles? The lumpy osage orange, the maple helicopter seeds? Look.
I knew. Without consciously knowing, I knew you were there.
Watching, guarding, protecting.
Nourishing my broken body and soul.
And yet I did not really see or hear YOU.
Did not appreciate and honor you as you so deserve.
Treat you with the reverence that is your due.
Let me be there for you now as you are so vulnerable,
Threatened by ferocious fires and winds, by rapacious insects emboldened by a warming climate.
By angry roiling waters rising and ripping apart your roots.
Silencing you.
Be still. Breathe. Rest.
Let me be there for you, hear you. At last.
with love, mbe
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