July 11, 2024 - “Shade Part I” by Kyrsten Jensen
She stretched strong fingers
outward,
deep ridges and pale
bark cracked, whorled,
each ring hidden inside her an
age spelled out in secret.
We pressed in, eyes burning
from shrieking light,
where underneath her outspread
limbs a cool, blue quiet
Settled.
Our fingers clawed, tore open
on splinters, nails gouging
and she pretended the marks
had always been there.
She pretended she’d always bled.
She wept sweet sap and we
lapped it like smooth,
sticky syrup,
those amber tears stained
our lips and hardened
like a diamond coating,
so each word we spoke
cracked our mouths
open and slit like
a razor edge.
She pretended she’d always had
the scars.
As cold winds set in
fingers bent down,
creaking, trembling, curling in
as we etched notches into
her trunk—she batted the
wind back as we
bet who could carve the
most—who could
sink the point of the blade
the deepest.
Her arms grew longer
to cast her blue shadow
where we wanted.
Her bark grew paler
in the fierce, naked heat.
Her roots twisted underground,
red thirst burning in a
dark stillness no one could see.
We required a spring,
and she gave it—
sending water up from the black
earth to pool in our cupped,
expectant hands.
We drank and did not care
to wonder
where the water came from.
