BARK WATCHING

Everybody close to me, my friends and the people in my family (some of them are friends, too), know that I’ve been paying attention to tree bark for a couple of years... stopping for picture when I see something in the bark that reminds me of something else.  Looking at tree trunks has become a kind of Rorschach test, sans interpretation, for me. I’m reminded of that classic Peanuts cartoon strip where Lucy, Linus, and Charlie Brown are lying on the grass looking up at the clouds when Lucy says, "If you really have an imagination, you can see things in the clouds.  What do you see Linus?”  Linus says, “Over there I ee a map of British Honduras... and there’s a portrait of Thomas Eakins, the famous sculptor and painter... and over here is the Stoning of Stephen. I see the Apostle Paul standing to the side.”  Lucy says, “That’s very good, Linus.  And what do you see, Charlie Brown?”  Charlie says, “Well I was going to say ‘I see a ducky and a horsey,’ but I changed my mind.” 

I confess that I see interesting “stuff” in the bark of all kinds of trees, but today I’m not saying what.  If you try me with some cards from the Thematic Apperception Test maybe, and then show me an interesting tree, I might loosen up.  

When I grow up, I want to be a poet; so I’ve got to go on exercising my imagination.  

Does it hurt,

is what I wanted 

to know.

An absurd question

asked of people

in Croatia

or Syria or places

east and south of

wherever

who know a thing

or two

about suffering.

I’ll get back to you

with that,

he said after hesitating

a nano second.

“I can ask my father

or my grandfather

or my great grandfather,”

he said.

They know about war.