Leaves of Poetry is a collection of tree poems from poets around the world. Tracy Patrick, editor of the Scotland-based poetry magazine, Earth Love, and Stacy Savage (formerly Smith), editor of several nature anthologies, united their efforts and put together a chapbook that displays an appreciation for trees, and at the same time, benefits a tree organization. All royalties from Leaves of Poetry go directly to Ancient Forest International in Redway, California.
Excerpt
Green
by Loretta Diane Walker (Texas)
When I was younger, I knew trees—
not their names,
but the veins of green leaves,
configurations of branches,
vulnerability of tender twigs.
I climbed them even though girls
were not encouraged to do such boyish things.
In summer, when green was plump,
filled with heft of budding life on maples,
oaks, pecans, I watched boys
share secrets in a cocoon of leaves.
I wanted to share my secrets, too,
but was not allowed into their sanctuary.
I am older now,
but on this October morning,
having breakfast at a restaurant,
I stare at an unknown tree outside,
its half-naked limbs posed like bare muscles,
and remember the light and air
in my ten-year-old fingers.
The green, like a chameleon,
now turning orange, crimson
a sleepy amber, fused in receding leaves.
In winter, those leaves will wither,
and be no more.
This poem is a record of their existence,
before they are no longer like the Garden of Eden.
No longer like the Brontosaurs.
No longer like Sparta.
(Self-published. Please contact author directly to order.)
Enter the pages of diaspora in quiet introspection. Bathe your thoughts with subtle humor; synchronize your spirit-sense with history-in-heat; fall headlong with eyes wide open into
