This is embarrassing, but maybe admitting it could save me hundreds of hours of expensive therapy:
I have a thing going on -- with a tree.
A locust tree.
Actually, all locust trees.
As proof, I submit the following poem:
Locust love
Last to leaf
Last to bloom
Locust trees fill a fortnight
With their musky, sexy perfume.
They are legumes
Pea vines gone huge
Shallow roots unrolling lush carpet
Over meager soil,
Lawn gone neon green come evening,
Rabbit heaven.
They’re mostly crooked,
But when they’re true,
No wood’s a better sill,
No post can push rot
Farther into the future.
And come winter,
No chunk will burn hotter and cleaner
In the stove.
But best of all, their white flowers,
hanging bells,
Ring out the last of spring,
And their perfect perfume,
Inhaled in a parking lot,
Ushers in summer.
NEXT: BUILDING BOATS, BUILDING FUTURES
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Here's a great comment from Dan Silverman, a great carpenter, Wellfleet town moderator, former town fire chief:
"Someone once told me that locust posts rot an hour before concrete ones."
My friend Dick Morrill sent me a cool note about this piece. Only thing you need to know is that Dick is TALL and skinny:
"Thanks for putting together all the things I love about these trees. I think they are the also the first to let go of their gutter clogging tiny leaves.
"At a house warming party, (1982?) Jack Schmidt brought a platter of Locust blooms and a large bowl of whipped cream. I remember how he taught me to take a sprig, swoop the flowers across the bowl, tilt my head back and lower the lushness into my mouth. And again, swoop tilt, lower. Yum. The aftertaste is like snow peas.
"In the spring, I like to find a Locust in bloom and low enough for me to be able to reach up, tilt my head and chew on the blossoms, without having to use my hands to pull the branch down to my level. That’s how giraffes do it. Note the resemblance. 🤔"