Cedar Trees Poem by Suzanne Hayasaki

Surrounded by leaning cedar trees
We drive slowly along narrow roads
Edged in with drifts of rusty pine needles
Hoping each curve will be the last.

We break back into the light and sigh
Only to have the only road forward
Narrow and darken again
Like the mouth of some ancient snake.

Like mendicant monks we keep moving.
We feel utterly cut off from the familiar.
We open the windows and smell the green.
But this brings us little comfort.

We thread this needle in and out of the light
Until finally we see a house
And then a town
And then the land flattens out.

We spend the rest of the day on our own two feet.
We sightsee with strangers.
We feel relieved to be part of a throng.
Then we retreat to the comfort of our inn.

But at daybreak, the cedars beckon again.
This time they invite us.
They lead us down secret paths
As the sun sneaks in through their thick trunks.

How strange that the same trees
That seemed so hostile to our presence
In a different setting can seem so serene
So mystic, so protective in this temple.

How must monks have felt to travel on foot
In straw sandals and a cotton jacket
With nothing but a few things tied to their backs
And no place to stay at the end of the day.

What could have driven them
Deep into the mountains alone?
Did it feel like a womb?
Did it feel like a tomb?

Were they daring death?
Or fighting for life
By choosing movement over the slow, steady strangulation
Of despair?