Thursday Tree Love: Breathe, a Poem

Thanksgiving Day 2021

For this edition of Tree Love, I offer a poem by Becky Helmsley interspersed with tree photos.

Breathe, by Becky Helmsley

“She sat at the back, and they said she was shy,

She led from the front and they hated her pride,

They asked her advice and then questioned her guidance,

They branded her loud, then were shocked by her silence,

When she shared no ambition, they said it was sad,

So she told them her dreams and they said she was mad,

They told her they’d listen, then covered their ears,

And gave her a hug while they laughed at her fears,

And she listened to all of it thinking she should,

Be the girl they told her to be best as she could,

But one day she asked what was best for herself,

Instead of trying to please everyone else,

So she walked to the forest and stood with the trees,

She heard the wind whisper and dance with the leaves,

She spoke to the willow, the elm and the pine,

And she told them what she’d been told time after time,

She told them she felt she was never enough,

She was either too little or far far too much,

Too loud or too quiet, too fierce or too weak,

Too wise or too foolish, too bold or too meek,

Then she found a small clearing surrounded by firs,

And she stopped…and she heard what the trees said to her,

And she sat there for hours not wanting to leave,

For the forest said nothing, it just let her breathe”

Becky Helmsley

Thursday Tree Love is hosted by Parul Thakur on the second and fourth Thursday of each month. For more tree love, visit Parul at: https://www.happinessandfood.com/thursdaytreelove-121/

Thursday Tree Love: Trees Along the Creek in Late Afternoon

A pine tree? or maybe a cypress? dressed in Spanish moss

I took this photo last week as we walked our new dog, Marley, along the creek in our neighborhood. I love how the trees and Spanish moss filter the sunlight. On winter nights the leafless branches make the starlight twinkle. Our sun could be someone else’s starlight. Writing in stream of consciousness mode, I think of the Charismas song that goes: Star of wonder star of light …… Guide us to thy perfect light. It’s the holidays here in the US where I celebrate Christmas. Some have celebrated Hanukkah, some celebrate Kwanza. Let us all celebrate trees!

Here are more trees along my neighborhood creek.

A close up of the photo above

Sun peeking through the branches

Star of Wonder

This must’ve been springtime

Sunset at the Creek

David and Marley

Thursday Tree love is hosted on the second and fourth Thursday of each month by Parul Thankur. For more tree love, visit Parul’s post.

Thursday Tree Love: My Adopted Gingko

There’s a lot of tree planting going on in my city. That’s a good thing, but we also need to do a better job of preserving the mature trees, the canopy. During the dry spring and summer, some of the newly planted trees were dying. I signed up to adopt one that had been planted a few miles from my house. My job has been to give this tree five gallons of water during any week that lacked significant rain. Sometimes, I give a little water to the tree nearby who has supposedly been adopted by another person.

When I first visited my adopted tree in the spring, I was surprised to see it terribly bent over from the wind. Someone had put a stick next to it to try to prop it up, but it wasn’t working.

My first visit.

I tried to prop it up after the first watering.

Within a few days, I got David to help me put in some better support.

I visited yesterday and it was still doing okay. Greener than the other trees in nearby.

I’ll try to get another photo when the leaves change.

Thursday Tree Love is hosted by Parul Thakur on the second and fourth Thursday of each month. For more tree love, visit Parul ‘s blog here.

Thursday Tree Love: Trees as Artists ~ with Faces, a Wing, and a Heart

Do you ever see shapes in tree trunks? Are these just random shapes that our mind interprets as meaningful images, a psychological phenomenon called, pareidolia? Or is it possible that trees are creating art or maybe sending us signs? Who can say for sure? Here are some examples I’ve seen recently in my neighborhood…

I see at least three faces, two in profile, and a wing.
What do you see?

The hemlock below is one I’ve shared before, but I had not noticed the gnarly face until recently. The face in the photo on the right reminds me of an alien wizard type character I’ve seen somewhere before, but I can’t quite place it.

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The eyes in the face I see are set far apart like a turtle. The mustache reminds me of the owl in the Secret of NIMH. My husband sort of sees a grumbly face, but he also sees a person’s body emerging from the tree with my “mustache” as legs.

Many dogwoods in my area have succumbed to a disease. I’m still in denial about my dogwood being dead as a tall evergreen shrub nearby hides its bare branches. My neighbor’s deceased dogwood stood alone and was clearly not coming back from the dead, so she had it cut down. Here’s a heart that could not be seen until after the tree was cut.

What signs have you seen from trees?

Thursday Tree Love is hosted by Parul Thakur on the second and fourth Thursday of each month. For more tree love, visit Parul’s blog here.

Thursday Tree Love: A Bowl and a Bend

I can only begin to imagine what might have given this tree such an unusual shape with a bowl at the bottom and a slender trunk bent back into an arch, yet still growing leaves. We discovered this unique individual on my daughter’s May birthday hike through a nature preserve in southeatern North Carolina. I do not know what kind of tree it is, perhaps some kind of laurel, but I do know that it is a survivor. Here are some close ups:

The Ev-Henwood Nature Preserve contains a variety of habitats and diverse terrain:

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  Main trail

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  Regeneration

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  Natural Foundations

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  Cypress

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  Pond

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  Palms and Cypress

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  Meadow

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  Granddaughter talking to a turtle

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  Turtle

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Thursday Tree Love is hosted by Parul Thakur on the secon and fourth Thursday of each month. For more tree love, visit: https://www.happinessandfood.com/thursdaytreelove-115/

Thursday Tree Love: A Poem and a Willow

WHEN I AM AMONG THE TREES
by Mary Oliver

When I am among the trees,
especially the willows and the honey locust,
equally the beech, the oaks and the pines,
they give off such hints of gladness.
I would almost say that they save me, and daily.
I am so distant from the hope of myself,
in which I have goodness, and discernment,
and never hurry through the world
but walk slowly, and bow often.
Around me the trees stir in their leaves
and call out, “Stay awhile.”
The light flows from their branches.
And they call again, “It’s simple,” they say,
“and you too have come
into the world to do this, to go easy, to be filled
with light, and to shine.”

I love weeping willows and looked for at least a year for one to accompany Mary Oliver’s poem that mentions them. What a surprise when I noticed this one hiding in plain sight behind my pharmacy which is located on a busy street. The willow, along with a water loving cypress, seem to be part of a small retention pond and drainage system created behind the pharmacy. There’s an auto repair business to the right, so this system probably filters a lot of city waste.

It looks like somebody’s mowed the grass recently near the cypress.

I wonder if the cage like structure could be a trash collecting device.
One day, I’ll investigate further.

Thursday Tree Love is hosted by Parul Thakur on the second and forth Thursday of each month. For more tree love visit Paurl at the link below:

https://www.happinessandfood.com/thursdaytreelove-114/

Thursday Tree Love: My Favorite Live Oak

“When we are OPEN, we have freedom, courage and creativity – not just to explore uncharted territories where intuition may lead, but also to move beyond limits.”

― Zamm Zamudio, Intuition: Discover the Inner Workings of our World –

This is my favorite live oak so far in southeastern North Carolina. It lives in a city park near a lake encircled by a five mile trail. Southern Live Oaks (Quercus Virginiana) are famous for their large, low, spreading branches. Some branches may even rest on the ground like South Carolina’s Angel Oak which I hope to visit one day.

I hope this gives you an idea of the tree’s size.

Thursday Tree Love is hosted by Parul Thankur on the second and fourth Thursday of each month. For more tree love, visit:

#ThursdayTreeLove – 111 – happiness and food

Thursday Tree Love: Tulip Tree

The tulip tree (Liriodendron tulipifera) is another early bloomer in the eastern US. The blossoms can be pink, white with pink, purple, or yellow. They are sometimes called “Ann Magnolia” or “Ann Star Magnolia.” I took these photos a couple of weeks ago on a gray day at the same park where the cypress live by the lake.

With many branches still bare,
the tulip tree blossoms offered a welcome splash of color.

Thursday Tree Love is hosted by Parul Thakur on the second and fourth Thursday of each month.

For more Tree Love, visit:

#ThursdayTreeLove – 107 – happiness and food

Thursday Tree Love: Early Bloomer (Bradford Pear)

“Expect to have hope rekindled. Expect your prayers to be answered in wondrous ways. The dry seasons in life do not last. The spring rains will come again.” Sarah Ban Breathnach (Brainy Quotes)

Bradford Pear Blossoms with Bumblebee

The Bradford Pear is considered an ornamental tree. Some people say they are invasive. I say they are prolific and lovely. The bees like them, too. With cross pollination, these trees can produce small berry-like fruit that is reportedly not good to eat raw. I hadn’t noticed the fruit before, but I’ll be looking for it. Bradford Pear Trees are occasionally mistaken for dogwoods that will blossom later with broader, more individualized flowers.

I took these first photos at my church. Hopefully we’ll be back in there soon. Do you see the evergreen mistletoe among the white blossoms?

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  This tree has been here for many years.

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  Bradford Pear Tree with Mistletoe

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  See the bees?

The next photos were taken in my neighborhood. The Bradford Pear Trees are relatively small compared the the pine trees and oaks.

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  This evening, a storm was forecast but never materialized.

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Thursday Tree Love is hosted by Parul Thakur on the second and fourth Thursday of every month. For more tree love, visit: #ThursdayTreeLove – 106 – happiness and food

Thursday Tree Love: Waiting for Spring

“In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer.”

― Albert Camus

This tree caught my attention on a recent walk to the little park near our home. I think this is an oak tree. In the summertime, I don’t think I would be as likely to notice her interesting trunk features or the clumps of mistletoe in the upper branches.

Waiting for Spring

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Thursday Tree Love is hosted on the second and fourth Thursday of each month by Parul Thakur.

For more tree love, visit:

#ThursdayTreeLove – 104 – happiness and food