Poetry Thursday

Apple Tree

No choice for the apple tree,
And after the surgeon's chainsaw,
from one stubborn root

two plumes of tree now leaf
and even blossom, sky's
cool blue between them,

whereas on my left hand
not a single lifeline
but three deep equal

channels -
O my soul,
it is not a small thing,
to have made from three

this one, this one life.

-Ellen Bryant Voigt