The scythed grass in the field has dried

and an old woman now rakes it into piles.

She smiles and calls, Gruess Gott, greet God, as I pass.

I stop to catch my breath beneath an ancient linden tree

its split trunk held together with wire mesh,

mesh grown to wood, wood grown to flesh,

this struggle to stand upright within oneself,

to staunch the heartwood’s weeping

here where my family lived for over two hundred years.

Tasseled blossoms dangle from pale yellow bracts,

their perfume the scent of honey stirred in tea,

the scent of home. Bee trees my mother called them.