Things in Trees

Welcome to Burning Bright, a weekly podcast presenting poetry and prose from Passager.

On this episode, things in trees. First, two poems about things that grow in trees, namely apples.

Jean Connor started studying and writing poetry after she retired from a career as a librarian. Passager’s editors liked Jean’s work so much that they decided to expand Passager’s role from just publishing a journal to publishing books, as well. Jean’s book, A Cartography of Peace, was the first book Passager published. Here from that book is Jean Connor’s poem “Jonathan Apples, Macouns and More.”

The valor of red barns 
cannot hold, nor that of 
covered bridges, nor the flame 
of sugar maples, nor 
warmth of the October sun. 

To see these last things 
and to see ourselves seeing them, 
we drive into the country 
when the foliage in Lincoln Gap 
says, “Come.” 

For a short afternoon, 
we equate the sum of the world 
with pumpkins, purple asters, 
baskets of apples, honey, 
sumac and scarlet, but can we 

be forgiven for this false equation 
because, on rare days in October, 
the world, viewed from Vermont, 
really is round 
with pumpkins, worthy of bees, 

their honeycomb, and sweet 
with the fragrance of wood-smoke, 
a world acquainted with cider, 
blessed with the willingness of apples, 
wise with the inerrancy of mountains. 

“Jonathan Apples, Macouns and More” by Jean Connor. Jonathan apples, by the way, have always been my favorite. I grew up thinking they were named after me.

Here’s another poem about apples, “Apple Spirits” by Fran Markover.

Poundsweet, Ginger Gold, Keepsake, Cameo –
heritage tastes at the farmstand remind me
of our orchard in the Catskills. Winesaps

misshapen heirlooms for the deer who found
them mornings. I’d gather the fallen treasures,
present them to Grandmother. She held each one,

read soft spots and bruises as if it were a reckoning
for the Book of Blossoms. This one’s right for
Mr. Needleman’s strudel. These two, take away

the worms, are perfect for Papa’s kugel. And the
crabapples – winter keepers for cider. Grandma
pared, sliced, cored in her floury kitchen, made up

tales of banished princesses who braved their
way home. Stories of peasants carving hopes
into apple skins, words like children or riches

engraved into fragrant flesh. Nights, after dessert,
Grandpa strummed his mandolin, eyes closed,
trusting the strings to tremble with remembrance.

He sang Hushabye, my little bird. Lulinke, Mein
Feigele. Perhaps the melody was lament for his
mother, unable to take flight, or for me, leaving

our family nest for school. As we bowed in a circle,
lit candles, Grandma’s hands beckoned the light
toward her face, her heart. She whispered

into flame: Yitzak, Levi, Clara, Ruchel. When
someone utters a name, she promised, prayer
rises, blessings tumble down, bear fruit.

“Apple Spirits” by Fran Markover from her book Grandfather’s Mandolin.

Next, two poems about things that hang out in trees, namely birds.

Pat Anthony said that her poem “Goldfinch on Guara” was inspired by the hard work of truck farming and the desire to occasionally take flight from it all.

Oh, how we flew today, me grasping those 
hollow bones like tiny rudders against your 
jerky scallops, dips, sunflower seed snatching 
dives. Total concentration to keep from tumbling 

into the fisted heads of Queen Anne's Lace tied 
by invisible fingers against marauding beaks and 
pincer claws. Mid-flight, I heard the farmer rumbling 
like an old truck about worms on the onions 

but I kept on flying past the endless rows of beans 
and tomatoes, putting distance between us and 
those full bushels waiting for blanching, freezing. 
We rocketed away until I'm unsure how I find my hands 

full of asters, in this prickly sweater, a single goldfinch 
scolding from a spray of guara like we're secret friends. 

Pat Anthony’s poem “Goldfinch on Guara.”

Finally, by Jennifer Wallace from her book The Want Fire, “At Daybreak.”

Waiting for the Oriole Under the Serviceberry Tree

I swear - the orange bird did come once to this tree 
under which I now sit with my camera and fancy lens. 
It's good medicine to wait for a bird, to try to chase it 
doesn't work. The more I look, the faster it recedes, too 
high into the tall pines. A cardinal came to rescue me, 
a ruby throat, too. But they didn't stay long enough 
to do much good. 

So, while I contemplate another hard winter passed, 
the peeled paint on the steps I fix each year, a friend – 
dead, another pissed off at her boss, and a grandchild yet 
to arrive, the bees in the berry blossoms promise summer 
pies. And all the while, the question mark that is 
the absent oriole whistles the same old song. But the bird 
won't come, has other worms to fry and the world won't 
behave, not even for me, though - by God - 
I wish it would try.

“At Daybreak,” Jennifer Wallace.

To buy The Want Fire or Jean Connors’s book A Cartography of Peace or to subscribe to or learn more about Passager and its commitment to writers over 50, go to passagerbooks.com. You can download Burning Bright from Spotify, Apple and Google Podcasts, and various other podcast apps.

For Kendra, Mary, Christine, Rosanne, and the rest of the Passager staff, I’m Jon Shorr.