Pine And Cherryblossoms (Toma Dojo Year 3) Poem by LaClaire mitchell nzerem

(TOMA Dojo Year 3)

#1
Hard yet soft.
Let me be strong like pine.
But let my heart be soft
when I need to be human.
Let me feel.
Let me not become like stone.

#2
Wooden Sacrifice

I would say i am sometimes
as wood.
Unbreakable.
For I yes I
have been cut, bled and broken into
pulp.
Pained like pine and nobody saw.
Saw me shaking fearfully in the wind.
trembling without a mercenary at the moments impending
tick of seconds
as the cutter drew back his hand.
The saw swung carelessly by strong- sweaty bruised
calloused and angry arms,
determined at my breaking.
Going numb at the severing splintered crack of blade
against flesh.
Oh pine, made to be broken by those duty- bound hands
and pre-arranged orders of execution.
Forgive me if by necessity the saplike blood finds my guilt
in past association and present partaking.
For I have also faced the guillotine,
and often times have been fodder to feed the
hungry flames.
I have bled and broken like pine,
yet
I stand.

#3 Loosing My Blue Spruce



There is a place
where I would watch you from the window evenings
so velvet blue and beautiful as the dew danced upon
your needles.
I would go out in early morning as the sunrose to see
the rays light golden and peeking through to carress your
tender branches.
I would admiringly think of how tall you would one day be
and lean against you as I bowed to pull a weed and feel
enchanted by the patchouli fragrance of woodlands.
But somehow I could never coax you into believing,
that the place by white pine lining the yard like tall green sentinels,
was meant for you alone.
For some reasons the winters were too rough and you browned
in early spring.
Sadly I gave up and though I mulched and tried, there was no
convincing you.
Waterlogged and sickened, small knats fiddled a last seranade dancing
around you into late spring.
I took you down at the feet and promptly you leaned headfirst against
my shoulder as if you understood what must be done and
let me know i was obsolved from any wrong doing.
In one last parting consolation, I let you go.
The space in my yard is empty now
where you once made everything
serene and complete.