A massive American Sycamore
(or maybe it's a Silver Maple)
lays felled, its crown
down the hill, towards the river.
Its flared base aims
towards the canal.
Cupcake liner pleats
present upwards to any
passersby on the
busy wooded path.
Up and outward
for anyone's viewing
are the many concentric rings.
An encyclopedia, a repository
of history and nature.
Proof of life,
each band a testament.
Receipts of resilience.
Its sheer size arrests my legs;
I stop to crouch down and stare.
I snap a quick photo on wobbly feet.
The ground beneath me is
unsteady, disrupted from the
abrupt loss of its tallest resident.
As I lean in,
I see that someone
has made a go
at Math.
There are what I take to be
year demarcations
from the bark inward,
etched with black Sharpie
in a confident hand:
2025
2020
2015
2010
2000
1999
1982
1975
1960
1950
1940
1930
...
And if you are to believe
the writer's counting
prowess, then the
heartwood would have
grown in the 1920s;
I suspect even earlier.
And, although mid-walk
with a partner,
this sight steals my breath.
I pause.
I ponder.
In the 1920s, when this
East Coast equivalent
of a giant sequoia
was but a wee acorn,
I think back to what
I learned in history class.
The Great Depression
Flappers and bobs
The Great Gatsby
Votes for Women!
Prohibition
— and rum running —
in the States.
Josephine Baker
shimmered in France.
All my grandparents,
born in the U.S.A.
1930s and 1940s:
The Second World War.
Pearl Harbor.
Citizen Kane.
My future in-laws
escaped Europe.
The Holocaust.
Enola Gay;
Little Boy. Hiroshima.
Fat Man. Nagasaki.
Do these tree rings
carry embedded evidence
of man's destruction?
The 1950s:
Rosalind Franklin discovered
a double helix in DNA.
Emmett Till murdered.
My parents and in-laws,
all born throughout the East.
My Great Uncle:
shot down in
Kangdong, Korea.
My elders hang on hope,
and fear.
Six excruciating years
before final confirmation
of his death.
One of 54,246
U.S. servicemen, KIA.
The 1960s:
The Beatles
Brown v Board of Education
Kennedy, John F. Jr.
in Dallas; Jackie's pink suit.
My great-grandparents
publish a book
on nature poetry.
Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr.
stolen from us.
Kennedy, Bobby Sr.
next to die.
Man lands on the Moon.
Woodstock.
No-fault divorce ruled legal.
The 1970s:
The Watergate scandal.
Nixon — all of that.
My aunts ironed their
strawberry blond hair flat.
My mom takes Poetry class
instead of English Comp.
My Dad crashed one,
then two family Pintos.
Women can get credit cards.
My parents meet on the Quad.
Jaws terrifies the world.
Camp David Peace Accords.
The Energy Crisis.
Title IX.
My parents hold hands
and each say: "I do."
The 1980s:
A Hollywood actor
becomes President.
First female
Supreme Court justice.
Mount Saint Helens erupts.
E.T. —The Extraterrestrial.
I was born, and so.
Now I can add memories.
A new NASA era - the STS!
I learn how to walk, then talk.
I get a sister.
The STS Challenger explodes.
Reaganomics: Trickle-down.
The Berlin Wall falls;
all thanks to The Hoff,
if you believe him.
Billy Joel asserts:
We Didn't Start the Fire.
The 1990s, formative years:
I survive second grade.
I get a hot pink retainer
which I throw out
in the lunchroom.
Clip Calvin and Hobbes
in color from the Sunday Post.
Trade slap bracelets and
puffy stickers in the school yard.
Bush Sr. throws up on
Japanese Prime Minister,
Kiichi Miyazawa.
I forded a river;
my oxen died.
The Gulf War and
Operation Desert Storm.
I write "saddam hussein"
in lowercase in my diary,
my form of discontent.
I hustle Girl Scout cookies.
Snoop Doggy-Dog.
The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.
Sleep-Away Summer Camp.
I graduate eighth grade.
Dawson's Creek.
He tells us, under oath:
"I Did Not Have Sexual Relations
With That Woman!"
And later:
"It depends on
what the definition of 'is' is."
First braces with neon bands.
My first kiss.
My first cellular phone.
Attend cheerleading camp.
Attend Marine Biology camp.
Party like it's nineteen nintey-nine.
Endure the Y2K Crisis that wasn't.
The 2000s are a blur:
I attend College at 17.
9/11 ends my childhood.
The Terminator from Austria
becomes California Governor.
The Indian Ocean Tsunami.
Like a walking statistic,
one of those "Young Men with a
Promising Future Path"
body-checks me right off of mine.
I start to recover, heal.
My grandpa dies.
Hurricane Katrina.
Later, I am sure I find love.
Graduate college.
I get a j-o-b.
I get married.
Yes We Can! Si Se Puede!
Survive the 2008 Recession.
Buy a house with a VA Loan.
Auto Bail-Out.
House underwater.
2010s blow into view:
Arab Spring, revolt and renewal.
New Job, in the city!
I try and try and try
and try again to get pregnant.
Seal Team Six
found and killed OSB.
My grandma dies;
Failed to give her a much-desired
great-grandkid in time.
(I get a puppy instead.)
Finally, finally have a baby
through science
and health insurance.
Name her after my Grandma.
Learn things I can't unknow.
Get divorced.
Single Parent with Au Pairs.
I find Real Love.
My remaining grandparents die.
Move in with my Love;
a house with a garden of trees.
"When You're a Star..."
Locker room talk.
"18 Million Cracks in the Ceiling."
An extra from Home Alone 2:
Lost In New York swears in.
Pink pussy hats and
wall to wall people and posters
and kids and no cell service.
Learn to meditate,
deeeeeeep breath.
Renew my faith.
Get married again.
(This time it sticks.)
The 2020s are unhinged:
COVID-19
To Mask or Not to Mask?
Lock-Down
The Race for a Vaccine
Boredom begets creativity.
Tik-Tok dances
Facebook Live with celebrities.
Virtual school.
The air clears; pollution drops.
Are the rings of
these years stronger, thicker?
George Floyd
Black Lives Matter
January 6th insurrection
Reels and podcasts and hot takes
Generative AI
Political turmoil
Polarization
Red versus Blue
New Job.
Get a kid through elementary.
New Job.
Fall Out Boy asserts,
in homage:
We Didn't Start the Fire.
Raise a middle schooler.
New Job.
Spark creativity.
New Job.
NASA returns to the Moon.
Copy, Moon Joy.
I am standing here
now in 2026,
quivering on crumbling earth.
I'm absorbing the magnitude
of history at the foot
of this dead tree
that carries the weight
of all those moments
that I can summon —
and a million billion more.
This magnificent tree,
this sleeping giant,
downed by human buzz saws.
It lies here, slain in the forest.
This canopy king retains
all the secrets
and the explosions
and the traumas
and the joys
and the wonders
of all that came in its time.
Perhaps it deserves
a state funeral.
Those tree rings
almost uncountable
they encircle
and enshrine memories.
This organism likely sprang
from a pile of mule dung
along the edge of the towpath.
It survived:
at least five cycles of
slow-moving, vibrating
red-eyed, green-bodied
Brood X Magicicadas.
The War of the World
radio broadcast.
The Bay of Pigs
The rise and fall of AquaNet.
Menudo and Ricky Martin.
The LA Riots.
The hole in the Ozone.
El Nino
and La Nina.
El Derecho
Snowmageddon
Countless
government shutdowns.
The D.C. Earthquake
that fractured
both the Washington Monument
and the Belltower of
the National Cathedral.
DOGE.
They capture all that time.
They quantify progress,
holding truth
in their eukaryotic cells.
I slowly raise myself
off my haunches.
I put my phone back
in my 'roo pouch.
After a reverent moment
my friend and I,
we walk away
down the path.
All too soon,
the silence
blends into banter.
We pick back up
our routine conversations
about men
and kids and work.
= = =
As the riddle should go:
If a tree falls in the forest
who carries its memory?
Hopefully, all of us,
in some small part.
