Dreams of Sap and Bark

They’d been whispering all night.
I looked out of the bedroom window,
hoping to catch them at it;
I breathed in their beauty
but all I heard was the hoot of an owl
and the distant bark of a dog.

This morning, when the moon
had disappeared, I just knew
they’d been awake all night
from their hung-over branches,
the peeling bark and a trickle of sap
like tears from overtired eyes.

Were we awake, the trees and I, gleaming
after midnight – or was I dreaming?

Kim M. Russell, 17th February 2019

Dreams of Sap and bark

My response to Imaginary Garden with Real Toads Weekend Mini-Challenge: Strange News, also linked to Poets United Poetry Pantry

Magaly is our host; she wishes us a poetry writing/reading experience that brings pure yumminess to our day and invites us to be inspired by the following questions, out of the Strange News section of Live Science:

  1. What if the moon disappeared tomorrow?
  2. Can humans smell beauty?
  3. Do trees sleep at night?

She asks us to write new poems using one, two, or all three of the questions as a springboard.

40 thoughts on “Dreams of Sap and Bark”

  1. Interesting response — you answer No to all three questions, or yes in reverse, trying to assuage the finitude of each in the moment of observing the night. But the poetry allows the answer to remain Yes with a buttoning couplet — Were we awake, the trees and I, gleaming / after midnight – or was I dreaming?” Yes and yes.

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  3. Ah, perhaps it was all of it at once — the dream, the wakefulness, the disappearance, the tears from over tired eyes. I so delved into this metaphorical homage to all the liberties, allowances, and experiences bequeathed to us by nature and art.
    Beautiful poem, Kim! It’s going to stay with me for long.

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  4. This is wonderfully deep and philosophical, Kim! ❤️ I was especially drawn to, “This morning, when the moon had disappeared, I just knew they’d been awake all night from their hung-over branches..”

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  14. Thoughts of an imaginative mind here, Kim. I like the night activities of those trees, did you enjoy your visit with them? I doubt you were dreaming. 🙂
    ..

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  15. I love the out of this world but still here vibe of this poem. I’m always taken by in-between feelings, by duality of meaning, by the dance between dreamer and being dreamed. And the way you disappeared the moon is brilliant.

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    1. I’m feeling in-between at the moment, Magaly, kind of on the brink of something but I can;’t put my finger on what it is. I asked the moon but she won’t tell me.

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