Dear Maple Tree

Contributor: Sally Dunn

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I miss you.
I remember the long talks
we used to have
back when I was young.

You were in your prime then.
Are you still well?

Do you remember me?

Is there another girl
who has taken my place?

Does she put her hand
on your tough skin
and feel life
flow up from the earth
through your body –
through her body –
up through your limbs
and out into the vast sky

as I once did?

There are no trees
I can talk to here.
I own a woods,
but none of the trees
will speak to me.

Perhaps they have enough
of their own kind around them
and do not need to speak to me,
or perhaps they resent
that I think I own them,
or perhaps I’m too old,
or they are too young –
for it is a young wood.

There is one old oak
that stands on the edge
of the wood.
But he is silent.
He wraps his strength
around him
and will not speak
to me.

Maybe, someday,
when I’m alone
in the wood
I will come upon a tree
who will greet me,
and we will talk,
and, perhaps,
share secrets.


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Sally Dunn’s poetry has appeared in 2River View, Rio Grande Review, The Perch and Straylight Literary Magazine. Her poetry won honorable mention in the Joe Gouveia Outermost Poetry Contest. She lives on Cape Cod.