Hello all, I hope this finds you and your loved ones well. If it doesn’t you are in my thoughts and prayers.

The following is one poem from a temporary flurry of art and words on the Tree of Life. For me this is a celebration of not only Tu B’ Shevat, the birthday of trees and creation, but of the importance of trees and the Tree of Life across time and cultures. My own cultural influences and ancestry is interwoven like an orchard of apple tree varieties that cross-pollinate to fruit, without losing who they are, biodiversity and human diversity is healthy.

Below is a poem about a rowan tree, infused with British and European folklore. Rowans are always beautiful, tenacious and mysterious to me, and I once heard them called the pomegranates of the north. The picture below, for those with sight problems, depicts snow covered rowan branches.

She grows on forest’s fringe,

By road, hillside, rocks bare,

Known as Rowan, Quickbeam,

There on life’s edge, she, the

Resilient one; the quickening;

Small, with hidden vigour, a

Midwinter harbinger of spring,

White and red, seed and blood,

Transparency and fresh beginnings,

Crimson passion, healing, love,

Veils between souls thinning,

A tree of life in ancient lore,

Said to quell and ward of evil,

Branches pinned above doors

Of insight, the winds’ madrigal

She, defiant against the animosity

Of giants, rarely to lightening will fall,

This stalwart force against adversity

My signature is within her bark

And in the pith of each red berry,

May we be a key, candelabras in the dark,

An invite to treasure life and mystery

And the arbours arms that we all are

When we conceive our life beyond destiny.

Antonia Sara Zenkevitch