photo credit: Tara Gupta 

Phloem

 The oldest tree alive is called Methuselah

And we might assume its longevity  

Is the result of optimal conditions

But this tree lives at an elevation

Of 10,000 feet on a mountainside

The soil it clings to is not dirt

But dolomite

A limestone substrate

Rock like with few nutrients

The ancient tree gets moisture

Not from rain                            but from snow fall

And enjoys a short six weeks of summer sunshine

It was said of this bristle cone pine

That it’s secret of longevity

Is not so much found in skills

For living long as in the art of dying slowly

Most of the pine's wood is dead

Life sustained through a ribbon of bark

After life ceases

Snags stand like ghosts

Chiseled by wind-blown ice blades and sand

Polished by the harshness of unforgiving weather

The dense wood slowly erodes away

Rather than decomposing or decaying

As my lights dim and the moon it seems

Is always blue

I find comfort

In cultivating the art of dying slowly

Though a bone-numbing wind

Tears right through me

As I grow

Along side mountains of Isms

In the limestone of American hardness

I am dying slowly

Pushing what life I have

Inch-by-inch through a ribbon of bark

Smiling into the indigo moon

As if gazing into my bathroom mirror

The moon is older than I and bluer

But age is such an illusion

And time makes fools of poets

Philosophers and lovers

Needing optimal conditions

And more nutrients

Than the environment affords