LETTERS 

The writer confessed to trees that, often, the modern world appeared a sepulcher and that the essence of the being had atrophied into crude paralysis. The paralysis was disguised by senseless motion that inspired thousands of commentators and false gods. The being no longer fused with the desires of a creative form but lived inside monstrous organizations and empty acts that relied on fear and intimidation. Ah trees, what do you say? And the trees invariably told the writer not to generalize about anything but return to the sources of imagination and inspiration. Old forms pop up to try and convince the living that everything new is superfluous. It is cynical and sneering.

He thanked the trees and listened to his imagination. It said, 'the inexhaustible potential of life is directed to specific areas out of which a world is built.'

'The inexhaustible potential of spirit is directed to faith and its manifestations.'

'The inexhaustible potential of the body is directed to exercise and exhibition'

'The inexhaustible potential of the mind is directed to what is useful or needed.'

Ah that is good, the writer thought. It means at least one entity understands the power of renewal and transformation. But then, what pasture will allow me to luxuriate in the renewal? What street will not grab me by the throat and destroy me? What machine will not hunt me down to eviscerate me? What madman will not pick me out from a crowd of thousands and shoot me?

The writer considered the tree from a distance. The tree had an intricate root system that took the nutrients and minerals up through the ground to nurture the life of the tree. To cut the root was death. And in the talking aspect of the tree, the writer mused, did it continually say to itself, 'ah, my roots are good because they sustain me?' And suppose someone came along and dumped poison into the ground, into the very root system itself. Would the tree continue to tell itself, 'ah, my roots are good because they sustain me.....'? Even in the second right before it fell over?

David Eide
October 17, 1999
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