| Venus and Mars
Are Alright
Fred Hsu, a
correspondent for World Journal,
a Chinese daily
from Toronto, told me a Chinese
person would
never tie white ribbons around trees.
"Do you know why?" He asked me.
"White signifies death."
These ribbons talk about death. They encircle
each tree as
a symbol of protection. This need
for protection
implies a history of destruction.
I don't want
to tell my neighbours they need a
tree by-law.
I don't want to argue about the rights
of land-owners.
I don't want to lecture about
environmental
ethics, our thinning ozone layer or
the oxygen
producing properties of trees. I want
each person
to consider the trees that surround us.
I know the trees that grow near our house. I
have wrapped
my arms, and white ribbon around
their trunks.
At chest-height, I banded twin rows
of trees up
Mississauga Road, from Lakeshore
to the Queen
Elizabeth Way. These trees and I
have slipped
through platonic boundaries. We
are intimate.
I pass them and see individuals.
Traffic slowed the morning after. People gazed
at trees they
had passed every day without notice.
Rumours flew.
A wedding. A parade. Activists.
Tree-huggers.
Some ribbons moved. They slipped off trees
unto street
sign posts and hydro poles. White
ribbons held
ponytails in place or slung from the
straps of back
packs. They gave a new voice to
the owners
of the property they adorned. Some
took them down.
Many left them up.
All made a
statement.
Why.
Why.
Why.
Instant answers
don't exist. These bows mystify.
They personify
the trees and take away answers.
A formal procession
in blue morning light,
ribbon rustles
in the wind.
I read of Johnny
Martin's tree. A white pine that
stretched twenty
feet across at its base. They
said, the flames
of its funeral pyre filled the night
sky with the
greatest effect
-like Tasso's enchanted woods. |
