We never look deeply into the quality of a tree; we never really touch it, feel its solidity, its rough bark, and hear the sound that is part of the tree. Not the sound of wind through the leaves, not the breeze of a morning that flutters the leaves, but its own sound, the sound of the trunk and the silent sound of the roots.
-Jiddu Krishnamurti
POETRY BRANCHES ///
I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.
A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the earth’s sweet flowing breast;
A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;
A tree that may in Summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;
Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.
Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.
― Joyce Kilmer
TREES HAVE VOICES ///
Walls have ears.
Doors have eyes.
Trees have voices.
Beasts tell lies.
Beware the rain.
Beware the snow.
Beware the man
You think you know.
― Catherine Fisher, Incarceron
holy land ///
Wherever you are is home
And the earth is paradise
Wherever you set your feet is holy land . . .
You don't live off it like a parasite.
You live in it, and it in you.
- Wilfred Pelletier and Ted Poole
P A L M S (on the) H O R I Z O N
Before a dream is realized, the Soul of the World tests everything that was learned along the way. It does this not because it is evil, but so that we can, in addition to realizing our dreams, master the lessons we’ve learned as we’ve moved toward that dream. That’s the point at which most people give up. It’s the point at which, as we say in the language of the desert, one 'dies of thirst just when the palm trees have appeared on the horizon.
- Paulo Coelho
T R E E |T E A C H I N G S
These people have learned not from books, but in the fields, in the wood, on the river bank. Their teachers have been the birds themselves, when they sang to them, the sun when it left a glow of crimson behind it at setting, the very trees, and wild herbs.”
― Anton Chekhov
c i t y h a z e
I love New York, even though it isn't mine, the way something has to be, a tree or a street or a house, something, anyway, that belongs to me because I belong to it.
― Truman Capote
C r O o K e D \\ Ways
“My kids are starting to notice I'm a little different from the other dads. "Why don't you have a straight job like everyone else?" they asked me the other day.
I told them this story:
In the forest, there was a crooked tree and a straight tree. Every day, the straight tree would say to the crooked tree, "Look at me...I'm tall, and I'm straight, and I'm handsome. Look at you...you're all crooked and bent over. No one wants to look at you." And they grew up in that forest together. And then one day the loggers came, and they saw the crooked tree and the straight tree, and they said, "Just cut the straight trees and leave the rest." So the loggers turned all the straight trees into lumber and toothpicks and paper. And the crooked tree is still there, growing stronger and stranger every day.”
― Tom Waits
WHEN GREAT TREES FALL by MAYA ANGELOU
When great trees fall,
rocks on distant hills shudder,
lions hunker down
in tall grasses,
and even elephants
lumber after safety.
When great trees fall
in forests,
small things recoil into silence,
their senses
eroded beyond fear.
― Maya Angelou
MAHOGANY & DIAMONDS = p r o t e c t i o n
M A H O G A N Y & D I A M O N D S
EMBODIES THE ESSENCE OF GUIDANCE AND PROTECTION
MIND/BODY BENEFITS: Strong connection to earth energy – good for drawing strength from earth. Enhances intuition.
HEALING PROPERTIES: Tea, made from the bark of mahogany, helps reduces fevers and helps ease diarrhea. The tea made from seeds is used to soothe toothaches. Mahogany fruit can be used as an energy drink that is believed to increase blood circulation and lower cholesterol. It is also believed to improve a man’s sexual vitality. Mahogany seeds are antibacterial and antimicrobial.
LADY SNOW AND HER LOVE FOR THE TREES
“I wonder if the snow loves the trees and fields, that it kisses them so gently? And then it covers them up snug, you know, with a white quilt; and perhaps it says, "Go to sleep, darlings, till the summer comes again.”
- Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking Glass
ROOT (to) RISE
‘If we surrendered
to earth’s intelligence
we could rise up rooted, like trees.’
—Rainer Maria Rilke, Rilke’s Book of Hours: Love Poems to God