under the old growth grove

The Roots

the roots speak to me

and draw my feet to lightly tread over them on a light trail

almost apologetic in its care to work with them,

above, great trees reach to the sky,

endure, and die when they must:

one great poplar against which I loved to take family photos,

now a bone-white skeletal column glistening in the sun,

in this grove humans are not the architect,

since the Ice retreated north,

roots, like these, have held the earth here,

and I love to feel for the purpose 

within such enduring will,

and I wonder at the web beneath us all,

how much it is plumbing

and how much it is more. 

by Henry H. Walker

July 29, ’14