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I Was Once A Tree
by
Faith Cheltenham
I WAS ONCE A TREE
Let's flee and be within
and understand what its like to be a tree again.
It's funny don't you see?
How many rings one girl can circle and circle again? Each year a ring
of life…ok let me pause already this metaphor's about to get way
heavy.
'Cause what I'm trying to say is rhyming away to the world where the
insides of things alive are simply stupendous and mighty, Alrighty?
Including us of course.
Let's take a second to be WE? Won't you and I?
Let's stand TALL on the limbs of our mutual likeness for all of us are
where life begins. Please nod if you understand, don't follow? I'll be
your leader Me the half breed and half breeder ME the bleeder.
I WAS ONCE A TREE
I WAS ONCE A TREE
I WAS ONCE A TREE
So don't mind the scratching of the paper against the pen it's just a
bit of sandpaper to skin
It sloughs off and runs amuck, these bits of faith stuff, so YOUR
parts can remember what it was like to exist in infinite spaces,
without confines in all cases.
I was once a tree and so were you I must insist, but if you resist
THEY WILL reach you. Words washed inside the meeeeee machine and dried
into recycled tangled tales, that I hope you might repeat on your own
tongue, making US once again ONE.
How many rings can one girl circle and circle again? Scratching paper
to pen, sandpaper to skin? Each ring a year of strife, remnants of
necessary feelings of rebirth and "re-life"?
Me, this tree, gives to you AND sheds some stuff, for life's been a
little rough.
I keeps rubbing on till the pile reaches high, blocking everything
else out from the eye, even the sky. Trapped in the defeat of me, who
ever thought I would die of suffocation? From the fucked up, from the
seizing and sawing the wretched desecrations.
From the secret life of true trees, something screams and then sighs a
reply:you want it back we want it back too
we want to rewind
quickly quickly now
gather all of the scratches
each individual line and walk backwards in time
HELP ME join dust together rhyme by rhyme, so OUR parts can REMEMBER
what it was like to exist in infinite spaces without confines in all
cases
I WAS ONCE A TREE
I WAS ONCE A TREE
I WAS ONCE A TREE
You don't have to wait until you know who YOU were what kind of tree,
shrub, god's blessed creature or golden retriever, just be welcome to
new possibilities, new growth, new pages, different ways to live as
humans through the ages.
My story may become someone else's tall tale
but in this moment, in this place, scratching paper and pen, sandpaper to skin
I will make what was once live again!
I was once a tree
Do the words now come naturally?
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