I can't tell you how much I love this poem.
Its unprepossessing tenor instructs on how vast and non-polemic a poem can be-- understanding/appreciation from the grassroots upward.
The artful metaphoric thread is the tree in all of its symbolic forms, invoking majesty, mystery, connectedness, and ultimately the earth mother spirit. At almost every turn there are unexpected gems, glimpses of small truths, gentle challenges to how we think, and continued feelings of humanness. In composite it is a powerful spiritual statement.
As with all poems, but this one particularly, the reader needs to mentally approach your poem in absolute neutral, open to anything. I think the title does a great job in that preparation.
S.1 is a poem in itself. The fact that it is haiku foreshadows the types of connections that follow. This is a marvelous way to start the poem. It was easy to imagine the "old cottonwood" made to "flutter and glitter" by "even a slight breeze" to be my father and thought of how animated he'd get in explaining some point he thought important for us to understand, more so when he had perhaps some beer in his glass.
And then I thought of my mother as the ‘old cottonwood’, who in later years, always seemed to come alive when family visited, to flutter and glitter as you describe. And in my own old age I think of some things that maybe affect me in the same way. And I can see the cottonwood leaves twinkling in the sunshine. For those folks not familiar with cottonwoods, this description is spot-on.
S.2 fits well with the even numbered stanzas, each being unexpected observations of spiritual power of trees, both in the history and in the imagination. So while the title markets randomness in the thoughts, the threads are cleverly wound together, stanza by stanza. “Enlightenment” may or may not involve religious doctrine, but most often will in fact involve a heightened understanding/appreciation of nature and the human relation to nature, and the simple wording of S.2 is endearing.
S.3 The California redwoods, some living since Jesus’ time, are viewed by many as spiritual, for a variety of reasons. Here, the poem plunks the physical immensity of tree next to the unspoken immensity of its death. No editorializing, its just put to the reader -- very powerful stuff.
S.4 – What a nice stroke to reference axis mundi! This again conjures the spiritual potential of trees, and is a delightful invocation of Yeats'
Spiritus Mundi. That any tree is a candidate democratizes the spiritual blessing. The effect is stunning, given that its all done in seven words. This stanza could also be a stand-alone poem, in my view. Consider whether to italicize
axis mundi. Capitalizing it as well may create a subtle allusion to Yeats' phrase. Not sure, but there may be some small benefit to that.
S.5– having had a big old catalpa tree in my front yard as a kid, this stanza made me grin, over and over. The leaves were huge, the flowers gorgeous, and the beans were in fact a foot long, turning from green to dark brown as they dried in the fall. And I recall the name seeming so unusual and distinctive that I can easily imagine someone teaching it to their parrot.
S.6 – I love this seditious undertone of this stanza. Trees, the big plants that live in the open air and sunshine have a dark side – an underground network kept from us mortals. Not only that, but the trees share it without our knowledge. I’d consider cutting the last two words - ‘you know’. It reads perfectly to me, but some folks may see it as merely Minnesota-speak.
S.7– this is another of the beautiful stanzas that could be a poem in and of itself. It reads like a Kerouac haiku– the tangible natural detail, and then the double turn– pure poetry.
S.8– This is a such a natural wrap up to the poem, but also is unexpected. I see it as the natural progression or at least accompaniment to stanzas 2, 4, and 6. The even numbered stanzas are all provocative declaratives about the spiritual nature of trees – and almost stated as koans, at least in the sense that each merits some individual contemplation, and then as a group as well.
As an aside to those fine writers who believe that countable accented metre is the sole definition of structure, there is much to learn from this piece. I think the structure of this poem is strong and tight, even if and perhaps because it is non-linear. And I feel a rhythm to the text that is not countable in accent syllables. The heartbeat of the poem moves unmistakably from stanza to stanza and to me is held more tightly together than interspersed rhyming couplets. Just my opinion, of course.
As a small matter, I would suggest you consider removing the stanza numbers.
To summarize -
unprepossessing, vast, unexpected, powerful, damn good, spot-on, clever, spiritual, endearing, stunning, seditious, provocative, non-linear, strong and tight – pure poetry.
Bravo, Indar!
Cheers,
T