Showing posts with label trees. Show all posts
Showing posts with label trees. Show all posts

Sunday, April 12, 2015

Chat with a tree today.

Western Red Cedar by Gillian Cornwall, c.2005
Oil Pastel on Paper $900.00
22" x 30"

If you have a chance, go to a forest today and breathe deeply. Feel the life, the peace, the perfect gift of nature. Restore your soul with the elements that really matter in this moment - life, love, and peace. I'm re-posting this from last year because it feels like a good time for it. I hope it brightens your day. 

A naive poem follows. It is meant to carry you to a peaceful place, a remembrance of how it works when we stop and listen to all of life and that we are one, inextricably connected.

The Western Red Cedar

I'm a western red cedar 
thuja plicata
green perfect plaits 
well-organized leaves

'tree of life' 
arbor-vitae
for the next thousand years 
I will reach for the sky


My limbs droop downward 
in peaceful repose
while birds fly and sing 
from my tip to my toes

I spread my feet wide
for fear I may fall
though I suppose the fact is
I'll outlive you all

I live in a forest 
you may never find 
It's a place tucked away
on the outside of time

Far down below me 
'mid the moss and the ferns
One day I shall lay there 
my death bed I'll earn

As trees came before me
may I feed many more
In the depths of the rich 
thick, lush forest floor

Do not forget me 
I bring you your air
for the breathe of the forest 
Is the life we all share

-Gillian Cornwall, c. May 4, 2014
Re-post, April 12, 2015

Cedar by the Lake
Gillian Cornwall, c. 2011

Sunday, May 04, 2014

Western Red Cedar

Western Red Cedar by Gillian Cornwall, c.2005
Oil Pastel on Paper $900.00
22" x 30"

A naive poem follows. It is meant to carry you to a peaceful place, a remembrance of how it works when we stop and listen to all of life and that we are one, inextricably connected.

The Western Red Cedar

I'm a western red cedar 
thuja plicata
green perfect plaits 
well-organized leaves

'tree of life' 
arbor-vitae
for the next thousand years 
I will reach for the sky

My limbs droop downward 
in peaceful repose
while birds fly and sing 
from my tip to my toes

I spread my feet wide
for fear I may fall
though I suppose the fact is
I'll outlive you all

I live in a forest 
you may never find 
It's a place tucked away
on the outside of time

Far down below me 
'mid the moss and the ferns
One day I shall lay there 
my death bed I'll earn

As trees came before me
may I feed many more
In the depths of the rich 
thick, lush forest floor

Do not forget me 
I bring you your air
for the breathe of the forest 
Is the life we all share

-Gillian Cornwall, c. May 4, 2014

Cedar by the Lake
Gillian Cornwall, c. 2011

Sunday, September 22, 2013

Autumn Gold


 The University of Victoria
All photos c. Gillian Cornwall, 2012.

The emerald greens have faded
The trees turn out their gold

Summer earnings spent
bearing fruit

or shady dealings 
with strangers

The basswoods blush
to a flaming red
for soon they will stand bare
aquiver in the autumn wind

The morning holds a chill
a nudge of what's to come
Though fifty times I've seen the face of fall
surprise and awe in every one

-Gillian Cornwall, c.September, 2013.