Marjorie Moorhead
Singing in the Choir of Trees
I sing in a Forrest Choir.
Tall, slim trunks; textured with bark; their verticality barcode-like, bridging to the sky!
I walk to them. Tonal humming begins. Vibration. Finding our song key, we are tuning our hearts. Wind is Choir Leader; clouds, audience. In concert, we soar.
Soprano, Alto,Tenor, Bass harmonies fly!
Childhood; looking up through deep green pine boughs to blue, blue sky was my Communion.
My non-disconnection-affirmation: Nature and I are not two.
A young adult, feeling apart, wondering what was my role; my station.
I observed, looked upon, watched, but did not belong. This I knew.
Attracted to outsiders, I happily loved, and lived with a gifted, afflicted Artist I found.
Using the language of trees, he went from “marcescent” to “deciduous.”
Withering, yet holding strong, until ultimately, shedding all; joining ground.
On Twitter, an account parcels out “word of the day.”
Using lovely forgotten or underused language; describing-words, they
name what surrounds us. A joy to receive these selected morsels, it’s invitation to play.
Today’s tweet delights with multiple words for icicle:
“clinkerbell” (Somerset; archaic); “aquabob” (Kent); “ickle” (Yorkshire);
“tankle” (Durham); “shuckle” (Cumbria); “conkerbill” (Newfoundland).
Maybe I will tell a story of ice, weaving one of these tinkling twinkling words into a tale;
hoarfrosted, mythical.
As Poet member of the Tree Choir, I realize how I Belong.
Perfervid, sonorous as an Oak, finding language to own that knowledge,
I sing it with words. My song.
Author’s Note: The words for icicle come from the Twitter feed @RobGMacfarlane.
Marjorie Moorhead‘s poem “Starlight in My Pocket” appeared in the HIV Here & Now project annual run-up to World AIDS Day in 2017. Her poem “Wandering the Anthropocene” is included in the anthology A Change of Climate (Independently published, 2017) edited by Sam Illingworth and Dan Simpson to benefit the Environmental Justice Foundation. Her poems will appear in the anthologies Birchsong: Poetry Centered in Vermont, Vol. 2 (Blueline Press, 2018) and in the Opening Windows Fourth Friday Poets collection forthcoming from Hobblebush Press in 2018. Marjorie lives in New Hampshire near the Vermont border.
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