James Graham, Becoming a Tree

From ‘Becoming a Tree’

There was a child went forth every day,
And the first object he look’d upon,
that object he became... — Walt Whitman

I nearly became a tree. Already a squirrel,
I scaled the beech I was most intimate with,
the one who had kindly grown a low fork,
and had said: ‘Sit here on my three-fingered hand,
and tell me what you have become’. I spread
my five-twigged hand, and fiercely dreamed...

From ‘The Book of Lascaux’

When we speak of them,we have to say
perhaps, or probably, or almost certainly.
But almost, almost certainly
they understood what we have called
acoustics. Painted their vibrant stags
and bison where the sound was good.
And the drums would beat, and the pulse
of the mountain would respond.
The hollow bones would bell and whinny
and the watchful stag and horse
would say they understood.
We try to read a wisdom
never meant for us...

From ‘Listening to Maria Callas’

My neighbour’s van growls by
with a stuttering crescendo and a long
diminuendo down the hill. Another snarl:
a rotary percussion drill, or something,
wakes like a serpent de profundis,
performs its ugly upward slur, and whines.
Enough. I power up
my gentle engine.
Track seven. Preset.
Strings whisper like blown grasses, then the first note
breaks like a morning sun through smokeless air...