Janet Reich Elsbach
Note to Self: Most Tree Roots Spread Two to Three Times the Radius of the Canopy (and can extend five times or more in dry conditions)
Put a mark here to show the man
and another for the woman.
This X indicates the ancient maple tree,
crazy maze of the crown above, roots spiraling under foot.
Erase the X. Show the tree.
Show the taproot, root cap, region of elongation.
Show every tiny extension pulling
inward, reaching up.
Show what’s visible against
the sky, and what’s beneath.
The day is warm and clear,
so strangely warm for winter and why not
take a walk, he said.
Frame it that way.
A box can serve to place the house
across the sloping meadow
(arrow here to indicate the couple’s movement to the south).
Inside the house the baby sleeps;
these concentric circles
around and around the basket,
those are for the grandma, the sisters,
watching him sleep.
This grassy distance here, (box to tree),
brown and dry,
is the widest expanse between
his tiny, fragile heart and hers
since the thought of him
bloomed in her mind
and the fact of him
took shape, among her bones,
and he slid out to face the full December moon
shining through the window above their bed.
Use silver for that light.
Indicate the grass with little lines,
a few—there’s no accounting
for every blade.
We will need a key; leave space for that.
How fast she could get back across the meadow
is a question mostly her breasts feel full of.
Move the mark
of the man into the treeline,
then adjust the woman.
Deep in the night she’ll find herself sitting up before she knows
she is awake, the only one awake
to hear the hungry, discordant racket of the coyotes
ricocheting up from the river against their hill.
That drunken cackling raises something primitive in her.
It’s so hard to gauge the distance.
One inch equals a mile.
Greys and browns for the fur, yellow for the eyes,
as you must know,
having seen them in the light.
Deep inside the bark, despite the cold,
a network of alveoli
is still ferrying cargo between the soil and the sky
(blue for that; the day is really fine).
This thrumming should be audible.
Draw lines to show it, there in the understory.
Reverberations from the tree
or her heart, or her blood or the milk.
It isn’t enough,
he seems to be saying
as the fullness and the ache
of the milk thunder into place.
I thought the baby would make it different
--these words hang in between them now, so
use a vivid color for that—
But this isn’t enough.
It isn’t what I thought it would be.
Did you put a compass by the key?
The baby is still north
of where they stand.
Show that.
Janet Reich Elsbach writes about how things going on in the average life collide with making dinner on her blog, a Raisin & a Porpoise. Her book, Extra Helping: Recipes for Caring, Connecting, and Building Community One Dish at a Time [Roost 2018] addresses the most fundamental building block of mutual aid: nourishing the people near us. She teaches writing and art to adults with disabilities, spends a lot of time with dogs, and likes to play with words.
