David and Liz Garlick are longtime friends of my parents, from way back when (the 1960s I suppose) in the days of Awali, Bahrain. I must have met them as a baby, but I'm not sure. But they've been one of my life's "traditions" because every year they would send us a long Christmas letter, with photographs and stories of their family (and they still do!)
So as a little girl and then a teenager and then an adult, I would always look forward to their letter. It is a bit magical to get that letter every year, to see how their children grew, where they went, what they did, their highs and lows, their joys and griefs, their gifts and their losses.
Eventually, I too starting writing back to them, and now thanks to email, manage to keep in touch more than once annually. When I wrote to them about my PlantMeATree dream, they wrote back to assure me that there would soon be a fruit tree growing for me at their home in Canada.
David - who is a poet and sends me some of his beautiful writing from time to time - also sent me this poem that he had written during one of his many travels:
A TREE.
A tree on a hill.
Not on the crest, just on the side.
There are many other trees
higher up, lower down.
I will never be a huge tree;
just a tree!
A breeze wafts, my leaves flutter.
A wind blows, my branches move
and my leaves speak.
A gale blasts and my twigs fall,
my leaves are rent.
The rain slants!
It is wet, it cleans
but I do not understand this.
I do not care anyway.
It happens!
I am a tree.
Nothing more.
Only small plants are less.
I do not think.
I do not care.
It does not matter;
for I am just a tree.
David Garlick.
Puerto Vallarta, Feb. 2001.
No comments:
Post a Comment