- Maple Tree: Wound
Maple Tree: Wound
The extended metaphor: “the emblem of yourself, if you like, or of someone, or something, else.” Coming
home from lunch with Tom and Mary, where I got a little relief, a little temporary
relief, from the agony of always hustling for the next thing, I take a stick to the bolus
of solidified pus—on the knot, on the bare place—is it the amputation place?—of a limb— [End Page 46]
of the giant maple that dominates my life. Once I touched the white lump with my
fingers. Lucy was with me. It had a kind of wetness, a kind of sweat. Disgusting. Ruth will not let up with
the cognitive therapy shit. I know exactly what she’s up to. I’ve read about it. Just keep telling the “client”
that he/she is fine. That will change the pattern of the negative thinking about him/herself. What kind of fool
does she take me for? Perched on her chair like that? I couldn’t believe how sweaty and revolting
that glob. I washed my hands a thousand times after touching it. Rapacious maple. Its wound doesn’t seem to be
slowing it down any. Our “perennial garden,” put in by Shelly, gardening consultant, is half the size, height, and
heft of Danny and Felicia’s next door. Whose garden gets full sun and no root interference. Who do
not have the greedy maple. I saw a maple tree, in the Bonsai Club display, at Global Fest. Grown from one of those [End Page 47]
wingy things, whirligigs. They gave the date it was started as twelve years ago. It was about a
five-inch-long twig, but with its junior canopy of leaves. It was planted in something china, a little holder of
some kind, looked a bit pinched. It was in with the poodle-like shaped bonsais— must have been a bit
chagrined. Metaphor! Where art thou? Really. Am I the maple or the gaping wound or the surprisingly
firm, obdurate mass of whitish excrescence poufing from the wound? Does it grow? Has it grown in the four
years that we’ve been here? Is it, at certain times of the year, more liquefied/ putrefied? I think of the horrid
discussions about trans-fatty acids. Oops, I mean trans-fats. Is that what I mean? Anyhow, it’s the kind
of oil that becomes solid at room temperature, also known as hydrogenated fat. I’ve
already got some of the waxy stuff within, hence the agonizing abstinence from fried [End Page 48]
calamari (how can “fried” be a problem when linked with “calamari”?). I’m sorry the tree is bleeding.
Is suppurating. I’m sorry, dear tree, which in truth I have not found dear. Half its leaves bedraggle, come
in late or not at all, die brown before the first frost. The tree does not look altogether healthy.
Ruth! I said, Oh, for God’s sake, Ruth, let’s face it, I’m handicapped. She nodded
but then went right on with her positive-thinking agenda. God! Who gives a shit about my wound? I can
hardly remember what it is. Or the glob of suet that hangs off of it. Or the leaves not coming all the way in, or the young
maple cosseted by some misguided Bonsai aficionados in a china pot? There’s something to be grateful for—I was not
raised in a china pot. (My wound, I think, was less awful than my mother’s. And more awful, I pray, than my daughter’s.) Wait.
Whoa. Where went the metaphor? And, promise me, you’ll never let my students see this. Not that they care one [End Page 49]
way or the other. They do not. Not caring. Was that the wound? No. I have neglected the tree. As I do all living
things in my life requiring my care. Benign neglect, an expression I learned somewhere. Right. I have tried
to love my daughters (love as in action verb, as in St. Francis). It is true that I refused to take Eleanor to her
allergy shot during her English class...