The Trouble with Trees

a reflection.

Recently, we had to have one of our three Queen Palms taken down. They are beautiful trees; graceful and lovely to watch as they wave in the wind reminding me of gymnasts flipping their lithe bodies through the air. I like to lay* on my bed on the second floor and watch the huge fronds sway during storms, especially in the cloistered breath of night. 

Her fronds once waved at night as photographed by me, 2017.

Trees at Night*

By Helene Johnson

Slim Sentinels

Stretching lacy arms

About a slumbrous moon;

Black quivering

Silhouettes,

Tremulous,

Stenciled on the petal

Of a bluebell;

Ink sputtered

On a robin’s breast;

The jagged rent

Of mountains

Reflected in a

Stilly sleeping lake;

Fragile pinnacles

Of fairy castles;

Torn webs of shadows;

And

Printed ’gainst the sky—

The trembling beauty

Of an urgent pine.

Even though I thought it was too close to the house anyway, the breath caught in my throat with the first cut, the buzz of the chainsaw ricocheted through my head as it chewed through her stalwart, tawny trunk. We planted her in around 2002 or 2003 as a small 4 foot baby. She had grown to maybe 30 feet tall and had been through several hurricanes including Katrina in 2005 as a young tree and Ida in 2021 as her adult self. (A Queen in the backyard did snap and fall during Ida, right behind where I was seated against an outer wall, narrowly missing the house. Scared the crap out of me. I moved downstairs for the duration.) She survived the snow in 2008, looking beautiful along with her two siblings, sprinkled with white powder that glistened in the sunlight like every brilliant thought you ever had. She survived temps below freezing in 2010 and 2011 and a few more times in later years. She was tough but I think the 2023 drought coupled with the cold temps that winter put too much stress on her. That’s all we can figure. The other two palms made it fine although it took a while for their new fronds to emerge. A baby palm from one of her seeds had sprouted in the ground next to her last summer. I kept nagging my husband to cut it but he never did so now we have her baby in almost the same spot - too close to the house. Oh well. 

….and in the daytime.

It’s miraculous how resilient trees can be. We see it all the time if we take a minute to look and think about it. Here in Louisiana we have many live oaks that are hundreds of years old and have survived through many, many hurricanes. But there are lesser known trees that have done as well, or almost. My childhood home in Mississippi had a huge Oak tree in the front yard - a different variety than the Live Oak. It was massive and had to be several hundred years old. It’s gone now, sadly, cut down by people who bought the place (imagine!), but I have a leaf from around 1973 that has a special meaning. (It’s a secret.) 

Woodman, Spare that Tree!*

By George Pope Morris 

    Woodman, spare that tree!

  Touch not a single bough!

    In youth it sheltered me,

  And I'll protect it now.

    'Twas my forefather's hand

  That placed it near his cot;

    There, woodman, let it stand,

  Thy axe shall harm it not.

    That old familiar tree,

  Whose glory and renown

    Are spread o'er land and sea--

  And wouldst thou hew it down?

    Woodman, forebear thy stroke!

  Cut not its earth-bound ties;

    Oh, spare that aged oak,

  Now towering to the skies!

    When but an idle boy,

  I sought its grateful shade;

    In all their gushing joy

  Here, too, my sisters played.

    My mother kissed me here;

  My father pressed my hand--

    Forgive this foolish tear,

  But let that old oak stand.

    My heart-strings round thee cling,

  Close as thy bark, old friend!

    Here shall the wild-bird sing,

  And still thy branches bend.

    Old tree! the storm still brave!

  And, woodman, leave the spot;

    While I've a hand to save,

  thy axe shall harm it not.

When my husband and I bought our house back in the 1980’s, one thing that attracted us to it was the huge Drake Elm tree , aka Chinese Elm, in front. It was a graceful, weeping variety with millions of tiny leaves and beautiful shedding bark similar to the Birch tree. Older neighbors told us that after the subdivision was developed in the 1950’s, the original homeowners on our street got together and bought elms from the Parkway Commision. They were planted in front of each house between the sidewalk and the street. The tree-lined street, with branches tunneling overhead, awed us. It was just beautiful and was a nod to the wooded country landscape where I grew up. 

The tree was easily 30-40 feet tall by 20-30 feet wide when it fell during Hurricane Katrina. The entire beautiful tree fell into the street, her roots sticking up like dark exclamation marks and the concrete sidewalk overturned, shattered and scattered like building blocks during a toddler’s tantrum. Miraculously, it missed hitting any houses. When a crew came around in the days after to move the tree out of the street, one man commented, “What a tree!” Weeks later, an out of town church group came around, cut it up and hauled it away. It was such a stable part of our front yard that it still seems strange that it’s gone. I miss the tiny, tear drop shaped leaves fluttering down like golden rain in the Fall.

Today the street has few trees and the front yards of the newer residents  have nearly no trees. (I say “newer residents” as the oldest resident on the street now.) I can only guess as to why they were cut down and not replaced. Too busy? Too messy? Too many leaves to rake or blow? There’s a lack of shade on these concrete-surrounded homes and the front yards look alien to me, like they belong on another planet, one where there are only hot, green squares. Trees are a beautiful and easy remedy for mitigating  hot days and carbon footprints. Just sayin’.

 That’s the end of the lecture section.  

Trees, like every living thing, eventually meet their end through the hand of humans, disease, natural disaster, or other unkowable circumstances. A memoir I’m reading (You Could Make this Place Beautiful), about the dissolution of a marriage and a life as the writer knew it, started me thinking about the parallels between the life of a tree and the life of a human. Both are planted, grow, weather stresses, grow stronger or weaker from the stresses, persevere or give up, sometimes multiply, sometimes grow older (hopefully), and eventually die. 

Magnolia 2020

So here I sit on a Friday afternoon under the shade of my backyard Magnolia feeling grateful for her shade in today’s 94 degrees as I bring this post to an end. This turned into quite a long post, for me, so I hope I didn’t bore you too much. It’s just that I get attached to trees and I keep being momentarily shocked when I walk out the front door and one is missing. But before long the baby Queen will grow as tall and graceful as her mamma, so there’s that.

Here’s a tribute micro I wrote for Flash Frontier to a theme of Trees a few years back, if you care to read. And, yep, I gotta leave y’all with a song. Enjoy! 

*Both poems are in the public domain. There’s an interesting back story to “Woodman, Spare that Tree!” at the link.

*I have to look up lie vs lay every damn time. Do you? Is there a trick to remembering the correct useage?