An Elegy:
Planting the Silver Maple

Maud Poole

The man, old gray poodle at his heel, wheels
the root-balled sapling in a July-sky-blue barrow.
A team in synch, man and dog halt
at the pasture’s edge, where the man looks
across Squam Valley to the White Mountains,
dressed in season’s mist-mauve. The dog, tail
twitching, sits, patient for the man to place
his gift to the forest. The man believes
this mission God-ordained. He will plant
a score of hardwood natives, oak, ash, elm,
chestnut, gum, beech, larch, fir, hickory, shad,
over the following days. The man lifts
the barrow handles, rotates the front wheel,
moves ten feet to the west, performs
the same rite: eyes raised to the far mountains,
body in repose. The dog sits, watches, tail quiet,
then on its haunches licks his belly, his paws.
Seeming satisfied, the man bends down,
pats the dog’s unkempt head. (The dog needs
a trim, but easy is summer on the hill; the man
lacks a haircut, too.) The man settles the barrow
with a jiggly-wiggle, lifts a pick, strikes
the thick-thatched earth, claws the point
until a rough three-foot circular hole opens.
Being in the Granite State, the man oft hits
rock with a sharp crack. Each time the dog walks
to the hole, looks down, returns to his spot.
The man pries rock out with a crowbar.
Dry soil pyramids form between clumps
of fescue and rock. The man returns pick, crowbar
to the barrow, chooses a flat edge shovel, neatens
the pick-whacked hole. The man lifts a sifted
mixture of leaf mold and coffee grounds
to his nose, sniffs, tastes it slowly, then scratches 
it into the base of the hole. He eases the burlap-
wrapped root-ball down one side. The man wears
no gloves. The dog stands, wags his tail.
The man rests, gazes at the mountains, kneels
again, slices the burlap, slides its strips out
from beneath the roots, releases the living
strands from their tight ball. Tenderly, lingering
on some, he spreads the roots around the hole.
The dog stretches, lies down on bluestem, his task
as overseer done. The man replaces the dirt, pokes
it between roots, stands, boot-heels the soil
around the trunk to fill air gaps. He hefts
the rocks to the barrow—will add them
to the farmer’s wall behind the barn tomorrow.
The dog walks over to the tree, lifts his hind leg
prepares to mark his domain. The man snaps third
finger and thumb. Startled, the dog backs off.
The man strokes maple’s silky foliage, leaf by leaf,
caresses the young trunk. He nods to the dog.
The dog alerts, springs to stand by the man’s heel.
Both still now, man and dog face the mountains.