Imagine their roots…
Abiding deep like hands
With fingers grasping every inch of dirt…
Long, curling nails avoiding stones,
And bones, and rotting earthworms.
Mean tentacles with disrespect
For any other creature needing soil
And water; dark tenants from another
Underworld…
You cut the leaves, the spreading branches,
And everything under the sun,
To leave the root, alone reminder
Of an embrace too frail to last…
When the last bell shall have had tolled its laughter,
And all the birds will have had nested anyway,
Torn out, the crown of roots shall tell the story
Of who we are beneath the grass…
Picture courtesy of: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/77/Uprooted_tree_001.jpg
THEORETICAL PHILOSOPHY 
One of my worst subjects was English literature and especially poetry. I can tell when I see good poetry but I know they always have a deeper meaning.
I need to be part of the committee in your head.
LikeLike
You’re in and on, by default. Now stay there, and read again with your heart/intuition. The meaning of – at lest my – poetry is to be grasped, never understood. Yes there are poetry-like writings, versified thoughts, but true poetry is the by-product of hearts…
Rage, and tears, and humiliation, and much death; and bits of scattered joy, when a poem takes of to live on its own, veiled child of sad, true Halloweens…
LikeLike
Very nicely written. Yes, that often is the eventual end of those who grasp and consume with no respect for the needs of others. I actually just read another poem by a former addict that exposed his revelation of that ugliness within himself.
Your prose also caused me to consider how different trees spread their roots in different ways, but most, despite what is commonly believed, have roots that remain shallow and spread out horizontally rather than going deep, unless of course, more water and oxygen can be found deeper rather than on the surface. But I digress.
By the way, how can a meaning be grasped but never understood? Grasped at, perhaps,
and yet just out of reach?
Wanting to hide
and yet,
wanting to be ‘found’?
LikeLike
Thank you for your kind comment.
Your last bit is the important part.
We grasp intuitively, with the heart, but we understand intellectually, with the mind. The grasped meaning is dangerous though, because it can be influenced by what sinks in through the mind. In the end we desire what we preoccupy our minds with. Such an individual’s true intuition has actually ceased, leaving his heart the resonance box of his mental projections.
We want to hide with the mind, but the heart reveals the true desire, in this case to be found…
LikeLike
Hmm… yes… true. Thank you, Moshe. 🙂
LikeLike
Hello Moshe! Great to ‘hear’ from you! ‘…grasped, never understood…’ Very interesting and very important. The same distinction runs right through mysticism – for Hegel it’s the difference between Verstand and Vernunft. I knew Murray Sayle’s mother. She told me her husband said to her ‘Annie, be big to life.’ Not bad, eh? (She also told me ‘Women are one step ahead, my dear – we have to be.’…) Very best wishes and thanks for your like of my post. Filippo del mondo.
LikeLike
Thank you Phil for passing by and comment.
I read my poem again, and I just can’t but agree with myself on the fact that true poetry is written with the heart, in some “raptured” moment of mental detachment from the “reality” around…
I tried to read with my mind present in this world, and besides an unfathomable sigh of having touched things untouchable, my heart lays cold, stern reminder of what suffering I’ve caused her, once…
Tears of forgiveness shall come again, when she’ll want to bleed anew…
LikeLike
Best regards, Moshe, Phil
LikeLike