A Hello Note to Ruth Grubbs

(Here is a note sent to Ruth Grubbs, who wrote a poem about this tree earlier this year in April 2009, while taking a writing class at John C. Campbell Folk School.)

Waiting for Rebirth

Never turns branches loose

this scraggly old tree in the side yard.

Hovering like a Brillo pad

unabashed over the driveway

she has all the arms of her birth

and all the twigs sprung from these.

She has bird nests of seasons past

hidden well in the scrub.

She’s naked now, but promises new growth

and more twigs to her full figure,

blushing green leaves to flush out her beauty.

by Ruth Faulkner Grubbs

Written in class at John C. Campbell Folk School

April 2009, accepted and forthcoming in Poetry Guild Anthology

Look Now. She's a Buckeye Tree.

Students in my last writing class took home a lucky buckeye in their pockets.