Poetry

Uprooted Redwood

Pascale Petit

My crown once swayed above the stratosphere like a raft,
each pine-needle tuned to the stars.

You can hear my leaves humming
an infinite green fugue. It’s as if dawn depends on it,

for ladders of light to be lowered through violet fog.
The sun paints an improvised harmony—crescents,

splashes, zigzags, a lemon lagoon. A blue blot explodes,
leaving a crater in the sky, cascades of rose roots.

Morning lies in the gorge, raw as ripped wood.

Pascale Petit