Something for a Willow Tree

Willow tree image by Jan Antonin on Unsplash

I wrote a poem February 14, 2025 and it has been sitting on my computer, unedited. Nor do I plan to edit it. I have been neglecting to share my writing anywhere, but on my computer, in my journal and within my own mind. I know that it doesn’t have to be shared, but there is a stifling that is occurring. A buildup of suppression within me and a certain amnesia that comes from forgetting my very essence. I process life through both silence and words. I make sense of what is around me by painting pictures with words, using the blank page as a canvas to paint the emotional and cerebral landscape of wonder and query.

Recognition supports growth in many ways, and yet I have surrendered to a deeper force that does not require there to be any external motivation in order to choose to be an active participant in my life. In many ways, I no longer resonate with my past and I am certainly unsure of where my current life pathway is headed. I have taken bold and terrifying steps to put myself first in ways I wouldn’t have dared to do before, this even includes being even more internal and not feeling I must make excuses or justify what it is I am choosing.

As I wrote in my last post, I have been unraveling the tightly bound restrictions placed upon me both by own false notions of what it means to be loved and accepted, and those projected upon me by people I was in close relationship with. The notion that I am here to fix anyone else has died a painful death. Yes, the need to believe this has died within me and the need for others to force this upon me has required me to uphold boundaries that have taken a tremendous emotional and mental toll on my well-being and understanding of my identity. In this collapse, I have separated myself from much. In that separation, I have also allowed a level of presence with my immediate surroundings and the humans and more-than-humans I have come into contact with. I have dedicated most of my energy to supporting the innocence and joy-filled playfulness of children. I have reacquainted myself with my tremendous skillset of leading, educating and holding a sacred space for children and adults to soften into their bodies and their sense of play. Warmth and open-hearted communication with a child who has only met me for the first time has oriented me towards what is good and true on this Earth. As the world spins more rapidly on its axis and the dark underbelly of nefarious intentions and deviant behaviors of humans is brought to the light, it feels even more appropriate to lend my strength to upholding the sanctity of our children. I will continue to endeavor to build what I have been dreaming of for decades, allowing the purity of the intention to be led and the right resources to come to support me in this. I do not share more at this time, but know that it will have a lot to do with children, play, nature, community, communication and reverence for life. All of the tenets of my work throughout my life.

This then leads me to Willow and how the medicine of the Willow tree has been a consistent presence in my life, especially during the last two years. As a May baby, with an Irish heritage, I was eager to decode what my Celtic tree was and upon discovering it was the Willow, I researched as much as I could. The connection with both water and moon made perfect sense as I am deeply connected to water and my emotions, and feel soothed by the moon’s cycles. The medicine of the Willow tree is an analgesic, tempering pain. The last two years have required me to feel large amounts of pain in a myriad of ways: emotionally, mentally, physically and spiritually. Throughout these transitions, Willow has provided the grounded patience I needed and the internal fortitude to withstand the hurt. During my respite in North Carolina after returning from Thailand, I sat by a large weeping willow tree that lived in the backyard. I cried often. I worried when the hurricane came and flooded the creek and the yard all around her. I experienced several ceremonies with her help. And, I tended to a baby willow tree throughout the late winter and early spring. Planting this baby willow into the ground, on Mother’s Day, prior to my departing the east coast of the USA for the desert southwest, held great significance and a potent medicine in and of itself. May we all continue to embrace the divine perfection of our life’s design.

I wrote this poem in February, several months before baby Willow was ready to be planted. The quote that prompted the writing seemed simple at first, but stirred something much deeper within me:

“Since love grows within you, so beauty grows. For love is the beauty of the soul.”

—St. Augustine of Hippo

Willow

The baby willow tree perches in the pale blue pot

atop a wooden stool, preferring light that

pours in from the glass door.

I fuss and dote on this fledgling growth

as if it were a part of me.

Willow listens to my whispers, my good mornings

and good nights—

my quibbles and quips as I skip and trip

throughout the day, in this body of mine.

It’s the two of us, growing up into new soil

together.

Our symbiotic dance has me wondering

who needs the other more?

On bright days, I place Willow in sun school,

as I call it. I encourage the absorption of

necessary photons of light,

birdsong and wind wisdom.

(These are necessities for a growing being.)

Willow is too young to be planted in the ground,

and the cold earth has not thawed completely

from winter rest, so we remain in our

hibernation, incubating our expanse

under the cover of night.

In stillness, I observe Willow and the wildness

of the branches that appear haphazardly around

the narrow trunk.

The divine perfection

of the design.

The stunted fuzzy white catkins,

halted in their emergence.

Goat willow.

I soften inside as I feel for the pockets

of bitterness and resentment within me

also paused and only half-formed.

The pain of the past, only partially resolved.

Injustice everywhere.

Even towards the trees.

I cry into my tiny hands, forming a pod

large enough to envelope my face.

The full grown willow, lends its strength

to me as I balance

acceptance,

a standing lamentation

a symbol of growth and healing.

My willow is almost there.

Whispering a litany of prayers,

of forgiveness, of beauty, of the soul:

“I love you, I’m sorry, Please forgive me, Thank you.”

Reconciliation is born inside of me.

Cultivating the seed,

I open space for willow

to be born.