The Wonder of Trees – Arboreal reflections from an Eighth Grade field trip in nature

A ghostly ash-color splotched with gray scars. Twisted and warped in the sun, bending as if to claw at its siblings. Rising high and spreading as if to grasp for the unreachable heavens, yet rooted deep and living for centuries in its unruly state, bruised and covered in scabs where it lost a limb. Rooted so deep, stuck, to live only to watch and listen, waiting for the forest to burn, to become ash in a new scar, to be healed and forgotten in the rushing years. – 8th Grade Teddy S. 

*

A carbon vacuum, emerging tall and tilted with the hair of nature crawling up the flaking bark, insects climbing up the treacherous grade as far as the eye can see, its babies surrounding the mother, spreading life, the trunk with its winding base indicating the beginning of a flowing underground superhighway of sap and nutrition. – 8th Grade Benton A. 

*

The white dogwood, prime in spring, a trickster perhaps, as its fallen leaves mimic fallen snowflakes, reminding you that winter still lingers even when it does not seem. The bark a generous blend of black and brown to compliment the glistening leaves in the warm fall breeze. They peacefully sit, in an organized line, feeling the city air as cars drive by. – 8th Grade Adam P.

A canopy of grandeur

Stealth, slender, slightly twisting to the sky

Its leaves come in three shapes

A mitten, oval and a star.

Its flower parachutes from the heavens

Of orange and chartreuse blaze

Flowing in solidarity

Until one takes root.

– Special Parent Guest Bill N.