by Julia Griffin

“‘Most famous tree in the world’: Sherwood Forest’s 1,000-year-old Major oak dies … In the winter of 2010, when snow fell on the tree, it traced an eerily precise image of Friar Tuck on the trunk. In other winters, when snow fell all around, none appeared on the tree’s limbs.”
—The Guardian

We robbed and gave to you: both made you poor,
And turned you to your own dry monument.
Weighted with lead, cement-stuffed, your old core
Struggled to meet our needs: where you’d have bent,
We forced you up, refused to let you age
As oak trees do; each decade, a new team
Subjected you to kindness, built a cage
Around you to support our ancient dream:
Dream of a merry life of derring-do,
Beyond the law, the freedom and the chase;
And don’t imagine that will die with you.
We’ll keep your body standing in your place,
And yearly in your bark we’ll scan the snow
For Friar Tuck. We’ll never let you go.