Listening to the gentle rustle of leaves as summery breezes
play in the branches of a neighboring cottonwood tree –
wondering why would a tree with lovely wind-stirred song
leave such a terrible fluffy mess lying on the ground?
A squall of snowy tufts swirl by, tickling my nose,
blanketing the lawn in maddening cottonwood snow.
With hair covered in velvety fluff, I sigh as it drifts along garden edges,
then sticks like socklets to my feet wet and bare.
For a few weeks each summer I fuss, whine and complain –
“the tree’s such a mess” and inwardly wish it weren’t there.
Well, the ‘snow storm’ quelled on this summer’s eve, and I thought I did hear
the cottonwood’s beautiful wind-whispered music beg my forgiveness.
Linking up today with Kate Motaung and the Five Minute Friday community for five minutes of free write on a weekly word prompt. This week’s word is question. Hello, to my neighbor and friend Marianne, in whose yard this tree resides. I hope she enjoys my question to the stately cottonwood tree and my unexpected revelation that the beautiful parts of life may very well make up for the messy parts.
Barefoot Lily Lady 
This is beautiful!
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Thanks, Winnie! Coming from a true master of poetry and prose, I’m honored that you think so!
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You’re welcome! I am truly humbled by your words.
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My mum had American Cottonwoods – a whole row of them in her back yard and I loved that rustle through the leaves as well and the bright light green of the leaves. Thanks for the lovely poem. Linked up next to you at Five Minute Friday.
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Thank you – I am going to try now to revise my attitude to my neighbour’s sycamore trees when all the keys twirl relentlessly into my garden and try to take over my carefully plated beds!
Your FMF Neighbour #48
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I’ve come to the conclusion that nearly every tree has its ‘messy’ stage: our birch has its catkins, crab-apples drop their fruit (and this year their blighted leaves), maples have their helicopters, pine trees drop their cones, oaks pelt us with acorns…and so the story goes. Each a mess with their own beauty too.
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