Song of the Roots
words by Nathan Weedmark
This tree sends roots
Into the part of the underground
where the vast endless
songs of the dead are sung.
Energy of ashes
scattered in the wind on sea and earth,
gather with the low hum,
oscillating from corpse to worm
And into the microbes
And into the network
Of bony wooden cables
Carrying the buried microphones of lost voices
vibrating through the earth
as whale songs cross seas,
Sweeping across rootlets,
Like a wind across chimes,
Ringing underneath the trunk’s pithy bark
All the way up into the leaves
And out through the throats of singing birds.
This tree, with its branches
High into the heavens,
Fingering clouds that
Rub the angels’ ears,
Sways like a gospel singer
And rocks the tiny sparrow,
Warm, in the leaves of her tree top nest,
Listening to the song of the roots.