One of Many Leaves

“Behind a pointed tip, the minuscule embryo of a potential tree waited, backed up by enough protein and starch to generate a first root, a tiny stem, and its first four leaves. Yet, for all the promise of this crop of acorns, life would be sparingly given; fewer than one in ten thousand would ever develop into an oak tree. “ (Biography of a Tree, 5)


Georgette and I walked by the lake once as a blue sailboat went by, gently enough as though it were not real but only a painting that had changed my life. She turned to me with those lilting looks, those deep-set eyes that had no end, and she was without sentimentality, only full of the memory of those moments gone by.

I used to move my hands that way, as though I was conducting music, and I was lost in my own world. What does this mean, to be “lost in our own world”? When I opened my eyes, I saw clouds then, and the blue of sky was the ocean that covered the world.

There were no endings, no real beginnings. I was a boy in her hands, then a man. She was a young girl in mine, then a woman, a mother. Then I became the child with curls, the girl seeking her mother-love, the girl giggling and sad, the girl with dirty hands, and a loud voice.

The sailboat continued by, tranquil. We continued walking. We held hands. The sun was bright. I breathed it all in, and the sparks and salt that flew from the sun and clouds were like stars in the brightest dark sky. The trees reached for me as they do. To disappear into green had been my dream. Now the green came from me, one of many leaves.