Praise the treehigh, leafwide skyworld,
praise the warp and weft of branchwood, the supple footways,
the shuttle of squirrelbodies plying their patterns
(oh, their abstraction, their improvisation, their swing!)
Praise the skyroute, the treeway, the tilted horizon,
the flip, the skitter, the dodge, the reversal,
the leap
Praise the geometry of space, its highways
and getaways, its tightropes and crossings,
its takeoffs and landings,
its plummets, crashes,
and saves
Praise the drip of sweetness in the tree skin
when the coldtime lingers, when the darktime brightens
Praise the small green shoots, the buds unclenching,
the sweetsmell and eggcrunch,
the digging and unearthing and resurrecting
of seed and nut and bulb
Praise dentine and enamel, the evergreen growth
of incisors,
the gnaw and scrape and puncture
of nutshell, bark, and roof
Praise leafshade in the bright time,
cool green flicker in the heat time
Praise the tail shade, tail sail, tail canopy, tail flag,
paraglider
Praise the tailflick, the tailsniff, the chatter, the scold,
the scramble, scumble, and chase
Praise the windfall of beechnut and acorn, the mastyear
feastday, the larder-hoarding, cache-stuffing
leaf-dropping windtime
Praise the brimming puzzlebox of seeds
where the winged ones perch and scatter
as the moons of hunger loom
Praise the leaf-warm moss-soft drey-dome
in the treehigh sway of branchtips
Praise the radiant heat of bodies in the coldtime,
the harshtime
Praise slowing Praise slowing
Praise all it takes
to survive
