Two trees
June 27, 2001
Their soccer game now at an end,
my daughter and her best friend talk
little-girl talk beneath a tree,
sweaty hair clinging to their brows.
Carrot sticks, juice boxes, cookies,
sandwiches all tilt on the spread.
Cross-legged and knee-to-knee, they
sit in the shade of a maple
that has mixed with cedar. The two
trunks are wound as one, but higher
the trees split apart, the cedar
standing mainmast straight, the maple
flying out like a spinnaker,
the young crew in its lee. I wait
on the shore watching, and wishing
such a boat might never be hauled,
that sail never stowed for winter.
(c) Copyright 2001. The Christian Science Monitor