Parker Palmer: Trees
“I used to take trees for granted. But these days, I know that sitting in their presence for a while will leave me refreshed and renewed. I wonder if trees photosynthesize the soul as well as sunlight?
But most of all, I’m drawn to trees because of something W. S. Merwin says in this lovely poem—the way they slowly and quietly cycle through the seasons, as though nothing had happened while our individual and collective lives whirl madly around them.”—Parker Palmer’s response to W. S. Merwin’s poem “Elegy for a Walnut Tree” in his weekly column in “On Being with Krista Tippett” (5/3/2017).
trees at the grand hotel with Spanish moss
I want to remember what Parker Palmer tells us about the outdoors, especially trees. Could “trees photosynthesize the soul”? Being outside with trees does do something to my soul. Photosynthesis is a process plants use to convert light energy into chemical energy (sugar from carbon dioxide and water) that is later released to fuel the plants’ activities and releases oxygen as a waste product.” Plants are like transformers, changing one form of energy into another, turning light energy into chemical energy.
Being outside in a forest does transform and quiet my soul. Soon, the busyness of my mind, the committee in my head, and my to-do list no longer manage my mind. I am grounded to the earth. I move out of my mind and into my body. I see a world greater than myself, a power at work beyond my limits.
As I return to the forest, I observe how the trees quietly “cycle through the seasons.” The trees are a permanent icon, reminding us that we are to be the “steady bow,” as the parent Khalil Gibran writes about in The Prophet. We are indeed all parents caring for this earth, which in turn also parents us, cares for us.
My father was a forester who, for so many Saturdays, took people out to plant more trees. Often, we would drive by the pine forest to see how they were growing. This produced synapse changes in my cells, so I always had difficulty seeing a tree cut down.
This poem is significant to me today, since two large trees in my neighbor’s yard just outside my window were uprooted last year. Soon, men with chainsaws took the trees away. I still grieve for the trees’ absence.
It helps to remember that our son and his wife had to cut down a dying tree adjacent to where they were building a house. They honored the tree by using its wood to make a mantel over their fireplace. Our daughter has an advanced degree in forestry and returned to Arkansas after teaching in the Wilderness Institute at the University of Montana. I have hope for the future.
I look forward to hearing about what you have learned from trees and how you honor trees.
Trees were nature’s natural healers for all those who spent more time outside during the past pandemic.
Joanna. joannaseibert.com