PINE TREE

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turns its back to all points of the compass. This sends the tree on a long journey into a landscape
that expands into its own center by shrinking. Everywhere is the smell of balsam, a blue-green
promise that wounds have no consequence because they heal, that before they do they produce a
precious substance, a balsam that heals wounds. The pine travels in solitude because anyone who
sees it disappears into their own journey, as kangaroos and crocodiles do in old cartoons. The
way is arduous and easy, easy as a round waterfall in the middle of a round lake, arduous as
anything that never ends. Its pilgrimage is to itself, which more and more the tree becomes,
always growing closer to what it carries, like Zeno's arrow or radium. It renews its marriage vow
to whatever isn’t the world, and the world goes on in a meanwhile of its own, outside the
increasing country, outside clouds of needles and fragrant candles, wedding rings outside of
wedding rings outside of wedding rings, the tree already living forever.