Thomas Locicero lives and writes in Broken Arrow, Oklahoma. 

Poet/Tree
By Thomas Locicero

When I was young enough to climb
And first enamored with the rhyme,
I’d clamber up my willow tree
To be alone with poetry,
At times atone, at times despair,
And other times to disappear.
So many opportunities
To live whatever words I please.
And if the leaves positioned right,
I’d have the light I’d need to write.
As seasons passed in too few years,
I’d come to love this tree of tears.
When leaves shed ’way and choked my rake,
When flake gave way to snowy flake,
When wind gave all that it was worth,
She’d posture tall and find her north
Until one day, a hurricane
Had plucked loose each earth-shackled vein.
The tentacles of roots I saw
Had struck me with poetic awe.
I’d learned of this, appropri’tely,
From children’s voices filled with glee.
I rose from bed and ran outside
To find them surfing on her side.
And when each happy child was gone,
I lay beside her on my lawn
And wondered how I never knew
The reason why she ever grew—
Quite certainly not just for me
Or dark or brooding poetry.
No, she was meant for bounding joy,
Not scaffolding a little boy,
Whose steps once lumbered, now made light,
Whose once-encumbered thoughts delight.
It’s strange to think the tree I love—
I once wrote in and now write of—
Though long hauled off in cords of wood,
Remains a bridge to childhood.
And with no shade, sunlight affixed
Upon my wooden writer’s desk,
When my imagination stirs,
I wonder if my page was hers.