xxvi

“Though a tree grows so high, the falling leaves return to the root.”

-Malay Proverb

Ever since the thermometer sticky-hanging outside of the house’s porch door started running a consistently high fever for the past seven days, I have been finding myself biking to work consistently less than I had been at the onset of the fresh summer months. 

This is, at least, the heated quasi-lie that I have been feeding my tired mind, pink-slip excusing myself from any form of exercise for the last remaining multi-hours of my summer of freedom.

As a direct drill sergeant result of this past week of excuses, the bike-traveled road was just slightly unfamiliar this temperature morning, an unfamiliarity physically highlighted by the newly-fallen oak tree that blocked my path today at the onset of the neighborhood's entry-way, which had apparently bark-snapped suddenly, unexpectedly during the quiet night hours. 

Revolution

I planted a seed

in that peeling pot

tanning outside my dirty window.

The seed took root and became a drip of hope,

a parachuting raindrop crashing into the sweltering waves.

And then that drip pushed out further and became trickling courage,

a metallic crevice etched and then scrubbed into the dying, porcelain sink.

The trickle then inched skyward and became a stream of fluttering strength,

a wet snippet of steam wafting in and out of those sputtering, condensing vents outside.

And then the stream took in a breath and became a spring of life

a siren song amid the drowning angry torrents of the gods.

And then that spring sprouted and became a flood of freedom,

a battle cry.

And then that flood became a vine and snaked down crumbling bricks,

and my cry was heard.

This tree and I are the same: uprooted unexpectedly, unsure of what is going to happen next, unsure of the path of the cracking sidewalk ahead because our big, leafy ego (the thing that brought us falling down to the crumbling cement in the first place) is blocking our branching line of sight.

Tomorrow there will be no excuses. Tomorrow I will rise early with the twig dew and spread the roots of my bicycle tire treads to the boiling concrete garden of my world. 

And then the cry of my bike chain, clanking against the gears and ligaments on the frame, will be heard throughout my neighborhood of one less tree.