Pine

Some days it's better to just not inquire too closely into distinctions, contradictions; try to make too much sense of things.  Enjoy the aesthetic moment, and let it go at that.

Today is one of those days.

Words and sentiments tangling in the branches of incomprehension—what Billy Collins has to say about that adds humor and charm to those inchoate reflections of mine on reflected pine.

Plight of the Troubadour 

For a good hour I have been singing lays

in langue d'oc to a woman who knows

only langue d'oïl, an odd Picard dialect at that.

The European love lyric is flourishing

with every tremor of my voice,

yet a friend has had to tap my shoulder

to tell me she has not caught a word.

My sentiments are tangled like kites

in the branches of her incomprehension,

and soon I will be lost in an anthology

and poets will no longer wear hats like mine.

Provence will be nothing more

than a pink hue on a map or an answer on a test.

And still the woman smiles over at me

feigning this look of sisterly understanding.

          —Billy Collins

image:  Christie B. Cochrell, Dark Pine