The tree in the garden outside the emergency room reaches up to the blue sky, as if it’s standing on the tips of its toes and ready for something.  To receive or give — I’m not sure.

Most of the branches are bare but the few that aren’t are saturated with delicate yellow and copper leaves.  Colors from my youth.

A breeze catches a single leaf and its neighbors surrender to the melancholy of Winter and dance along with the cadence of the moving air.

Threads glisten between branches. They catch the light and billow like sheets on a clothesline as the wind picks up. These silk wonders so delicate and strong snatch food for their makers.
I sit and wait — grateful for pen and notebook.

The ground around the trunk of the tree is covered with pebbles. Granite, quartz, brown and black, grey and white. I wonder where they came from.
Pieces of bark lay amongst the little stones. I look up at the tree and wonder if it will shed a piece of its skin while I sit here, but I’m guessing not.
I sit and wait — grateful for pen and notebook.

I pick up a piece of the bark by my shoes. Mottled grey and dotted with splotches of rust, like spores or a rash.
The underneath is smooth and pale brown. It’s brittle.
I look up at the sky. A thin wisp of a white cloud drifts — shape shifting through its choreography.
The tree reaches higher.
The webs stretch tighter.
The sun shines brighter.
I sit and wait.
Grateful.