Dominique Larntz * October 31, 2012

 

I read in a book my mother gave me
that school children in China
learn to plant trees.

The oldest trees are Redwoods
in or near California,
whose smells and crackles
embolden my memories.

I’d like to be buried in those odors.

So far I’ve only learned to plant things
in containers

and I learned it on my own.

I couldn’t go around flinging seeds
just anywhere in this desert,
on this concrete,
in my enthusiasm,
in my greed for growth.

Surely the ground is too bricked,
despite the refrain of moss
and grafting that repeats
in my mind.

What if I had
a reference,
a reverence
from the structures
of my world
so that I had no need
to wait

to meet someone
from China to ask
if they really learned
to plant a tree
when they were young?