Trees, dogs and Poetry.

Tree planting started for me this week.  I only do seven or so at a time so I don't kill myself digging the holes.  The seedlings themselves are smalll but I need to make sure I'm not planting them over sheet rock, because if I do they won't be able to survive the long dry symmers.  So, down I dig!

My first seven this year went in beside the queen Jarrah.  She misses her friends who once grew here on her south side, and I am hoping that giving her some new company will cheer her up. All they need done in this pic is their tree guards to keep the ravens and rabbits from biting them off and to protect them from frost.    

 

Mum hurt her back a bit last weekend so her two dogs came with us for the run as well.

That's Tuppy on the left, then Mama Rosie, then her son, Angus and finally Grandma Tess. We didn't plan it that it was two black Labs in one house and two yellows in the other, its just how it worked out!

After planting, it was time for a walk round Moy-Mel.  It is finally getting green.  It is only ten minutes up the road from here, but it is much dryer there than here.

It was lovely to get these smiling pics of Tess, because she is one of those dogs who gets embarrassed about photos and usually looks kind of shut off in them.

And of course Rosie smiles nearly all the time!

I was hunting for something the other day and came across this poem I wrote as part of my Ovate studies with the Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids.  It is about trees that have been important to me.  Hmm, horses seem to feature in it too.  I still haven't spoken about me and horses much yet, have I?  Soon. 

Trees

Picnicking under the Peppermint trees

By the old carousel

At the zoo

Their spicy smell and

Willowy leaves all around us

My Grandparents

My Parents

My sister and I

In our little velvet dresses and white stockings.

Horses on the carousel to ride afterwards

That's why I remember.

Curled, nesting, imagining I was a wild beast

Or a little dog

Deep inside the pile of lopped branches

From the Cape Lilac

That stood in our back yard

Every year cropped to a bare trunk

but every year flourishing anew

A slim tunnel from the edge of the pile

Over and under branches and into my nest

Hiding deep in the soft, green, sweet-smelling heart

I was a fey child.

Tapping, tapping in the night,

Leaves like impatient fingers

The Umbrella tree that grew in my Grandparent's front yard

That dropped its fruit on car and lawn

And patter-pattered me gently to sleep each night

Making shadows on the ground

That moved and swayed

When the sea breeze came to call

A safe, gentle house

A protecting, nourishing tree to guard it.

Mulberry trees

I have loved a few

Small child

Climbing in the branches

Face and hands and clothes purple with juice

Primal hunter gatherer

Enjoying the berries even more for that

Than for their sweet taste

A tree that feeds so many

Feeding the birds to their fullest

Till their very droppings on the leaves turn indigo

Light green leaves with lines of beauty

Feeding the silkworms at school

Feeding us jam and pie

And still I love to pick and eat them

Stained like a child

Plantation of tall pine trees

Pinus Radiata

Humble timber tree

Much maligned for using too much water

Stealing too much nutrient

When uprooted to this unsuitable land

But the Black Cockatoos love them

And I love them

Teenaged, sister and I ride

Down the long, ranked laneways of straight pines

Whisper of muffled hoofbeats on needles

Rough-barked trunks all you can see in any direction

Easy to get lost

Fun to get lost

Fun to gallop down those laneways

Especially on cool, misty days

With only the roos bounding away

To remind us we are not in

Some medieval forest in Europe.

The bright red of the Coral trees

As they flower to tell us spring is coming

Great leaves, like hearts, falling in autumn

Green the colour of lushness

Bark like the skin of an elephant

Growing beside the stable where my good roan horse

Would wait for me to bring him his bedtime carrot

Growing both sides of the streets

That I love best to drive down

Hardy and cheerful

Can grow anew from a whole branch

Just stuck into the ground

A survivor

A teacher.

Jarrah Trees

My greatest tree loves

Sister and I, older now, riding again

A long ride to new places

Into a hidden valley of ancient Jarrah Kings

Silence, only hoofbeats

Tall grey trunks of great size all about

Grey-green canopies far above us

Awesome already

But then a raucous call and a clatter

And a long-tailed peacock male

Blue and metallic bright

Flies from high in a great Jarrah tree

And on into the forest

Right before our disbelieving eyes

A mythical beast, out of place

Hard to believe we are seeing him at all

Hard to believe he can fly with that tail

But he does

And we are stunned by the magic of that moment

And our luck in being there

Among the tall Jarrah kings and queens

At just the right time.