30 January 2020 (pine)

seeing the old pine

as if for the first time

winter sky

21 August 2019 (pines)

Yesterday I had the good fortune to lead a haiku workshop at Hewnoaks Artist Colony on the shores of Kezar Lake in Lovell, ME. This haiku was generated there, under the tall, lakeside pines.

late summer afternoon

old pines leaning

into the sun

October 18: Mozart

Mozart up loud

wind-blown pines

also conducting

June 22: Peacock

rainy afternoon
from a sheltering pine
cries of a peacock

February 27: Good view

ladder to a deer stand

in the big lone pine

deer tracks in mud below

December 5: Wicked dark

Even in this dark
I can tell
those are white pines.

October 18: Pines

This afternoon I walked with a friend along the Little River Community Hiking Trail that begins just off Route One at the Belfast Water District. We set out on a brief hike on this surprisingly mild day, following the trail along the edge of the Little River reservoir up to where it narrows into the river itself. Near the beginning of the trail, you get an unusual perspective on the reservoir behind the dam seeming to pour off into space, with a glimpse of its outlet into the cove beyond. It looks sort of like an infinity pool at the ocean's edge, only set among fall trees rather than fancy landscaping. (From the other side, from Route One, this dam and waterfall with adjacent red buildings are very picturesque.)

The trail hugs the water's edge, so as we walked, we flushed from the water a few flocks of mallards. In certain seasons, I can imagine the mostly-forested reservoir attracting lots of ducks. Red squirrels scolded us periodically. We heard some white-throated sparrows calling in the underbrush and were stopped in our tracks by the cackling call of a pileated woodpecker, which shortly thereafter flew in front of us across the trail deeper into the woods.

But what I enjoyed most about the trail was the pine trees. The Water District property hosts quite a few really old pines, the kind with trunks too big to get your arms around, rising so straight and tall you can almost imagine them as the King's Pines of 400 years ago--the ones they saved for masts for the royal navy. These dramatic trees were true presences in the forest, lordly beings in their own right. And they had scattered their yellow needles in a carpet along the trail, cushioning each step so that we couldn't help but walk in a hush from tree to tree.

We pass quietly
noble old pines, but squirrel
scolds, gives us away.

November 10: Forest

The devastation caused by a recent rain and wind storm became more apparent to me today when I was walking a conservation property in Lincolnville. As the landowner and I walked through one dense patch of mixed cedar and spruce forest, we came upon an ancient pine that had splintered about four feet up the trunk and toppled to the ground. This towering tree, with no apparent rot, boughs still green, had come crashing down in the storm, taking several neighboring cedars with it. We estimated the pine to be well over 100 years old. And there it lay in a giant tangle, felled by the wind.

Elsewhere in the forest we found maybe half a dozen other trees downed by the storm. Some were spruces,  their shallow root systems made all the more obvious when upended, just a flat circle of earth perpendicular to the forest floor. In the small stands of trees, the crowded trunks provide support for one another. But when one falls, it takes others down with it, a row of giant timber dominoes. Or if one happens to fall alone, it leaves the trees within the circle more vulnerable to the next big storm.

In an opening amid the trees, growing from a forest floor carpeted thick with rain-moist moss, we admired clusters of baby spruce trees, the next generation. It occurred to us that we were witnessing the entire cycle of life in this patch of woods: new trees reaching for the light, mature trees clustered around them, some dead trees still standing, fretted with woodpecker holes and studded with bracket fungi, the newly fallen trees piled in messy heaps, and the older deadfall melting back into the earth from which it came, blanketed with moss, ferns, mushrooms, forest duff, leaf litter. A rich tapestry of organic matter, the stuff of life and death.

Wind's toy, this old pine,
whose death enriches the soil,
this moss, these seedlings.