Such love as that for the trees?
From my tenderest age
When I caressed their bark
With my babyish hand.
When I glued my ear against them
To listen to the rustling of their leaves
The humming of their branches twisting in a high wind.
And the snap of their dry twigs breaking off.
When I tried to climb high, high!
Ever higher. From limb to limb.
A bird without wings!
And from there to marvel at the horizon.
…And how unpleasant the descent
To touch one’s feet again on ground!
Trees of my childhood, tell me then
Where it came from so early
A love so profound for you?
Perhaps I was a tree
at the beginning of time…
July 1974.
Translated by Lenora Timm
