[Audio transcript] Hello, this is Dheepa Maturi, and welcome to Pieces of Light!
When I have a chance to walk in dense areas of trees, from wooded parks to national forests, I love how it evokes the feeling of connection to the natural world. Sometimes, I visualize threads—delicate, gossamer, almost invisible ones—joining everything together, me included.
A few years ago, I wrote an ekphrastic poem—that is, a poem responding to a specific piece of art, in this case Edith Vonnegut’s painting entitled “Clear Cutting.” The painting shows the destruction of both trees and topsoil, which is the fragile, nutrient-rich layer nourishing every living being on Earth and allowing for the growth of food and the retention of water.
While observing the painting, I visualized humanity unthinkingly cutting the threads I mentioned earlier—the threads connecting people and planet.
I imagined being in conversation with one of those trees, having access to the ancient timeline to which it belonged—deep time, even cosmic time. The title of this poem is “A Thread,” and it was published in the anthology Leave Them Something.
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