Five for the Forest
poems to share with young explorers
Forest Walk
I’m practicing my
I-belong-here
no-twig-snap
no-leaf-rustle
no-branch-crack
see-all, know-all
float-like fog,
like-smoke
pine-needle-soft
forest walk.
No one will know I’m coming.
No one will know when I’m gone.
by Kristine O’Connell George
To All the Children
To all the children
To the children who swim beneath
The waves of the sea, to those who live in
The soils of the Earth, to the children of the flowers
In the meadows and the trees of the forest,
To all those children who roam over the land
And the winged ones who fly with the winds,
To the human children too, that all the children
May go together into the future in the full
Diversity of their regional communities.
by Thomas Berry
Trees
Trees just stand around all day and sun themselves and rest.
They never walk or run away and surely that is best.
For otherwise how would a squirrel or robin find its nest?
by Aileen Fisher
Trees
Trees are the kindest things I know,
they do no harm, they simply grow
And spread a shade for sleepy cows,
and gather birds among their bows.
They give us fruit in leaves above,
and wood to make our houses of,
And leaves to burn on Halloween,
and in the Spring new buds of green.
They are first when day's begun
To tough the beams of morning sun,
They are the last to hold the light
When evening changes into night.
And when a moon floats on the sky
They hum a drowsy lullaby of sleepy children long ago…
Trees are the kindest things I know.
by Harry Behn
Windy Tree
Think of the muscles
a tall tree grows
in its leg, in its foot,
in its wide-spread toes -
not to tip over
and fall on its nose
when a wild wind hustles
and tussels and blows.
by Aileen Fisher