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Publications > Footnotes > Work from Plant this poem with Imani Elizabeth Jackson and Eleni Sikelianos

Tree Transcriptions

Marcella Durand

A notebook page with four sketches of the base of tree trunks, each getting gradually taller. Around the drawings are notes, at times indecipherable, reading – Would be -  to draw it back  into existence the braids of roots drinking down and then to assemble it assemble : draw if drawing can establish a place to draw you back up, tree to regenerate you
A notebook page with four sketches of tree trunks, each getting gradually taller. Around the drawings are notes which read – human I can do that human, can I do that drawing any tree it cut reality it was cut & makes this paper if no leaves then what is the process of life? trunk needs leaves stump needs branches roots need leaves the spaces of the branches become wood mirrors how do we see ourselves in the wood we have cut?
A notebook page with a drawing of a tree without leaves in the upper left corner, and a single leaf in the lower right corner. Around the drawings are notes, at times indecipherable, reading – draw a whole tree & lose yourself in the leaves the space where the branch splits in the separation lose myself in the branches the space at the end of a root to the last leaf & then all of that entirety messy removed along with all the mess every hairy feathery rooty part remnant does not remain
A notebook page with a drawing of a branch, a cluster of leaves, a single tree, and a grove of trees, spread out across the page. Around the drawings are notes, largely indecipherable, reading – to imagine a leaf to imagine back the leaves the space of where the tree was & how it was cut all the long little details of how the tree was cut leaves a space of anger fury – & no – what made me think of trees before this happened? do not draw trees by themselves if the branches are ridiculously longer than the roots but branches could never be ridiculous
A notebook page with sketches of trees in a row, their roots intersecting, and another tree below, in full bloom. Around the drawings are notes, at times indecipherable, reading – the human instinct is to harden the boundaries independence solitude loneliness eliminate the porosity harden the self  other we are not similar! We are not the same! roots tumble to crownS as if they are the same– bulldozer pulls out & turns over roots tips them up root to sky

Work from Plant this poem with Imani Elizabeth Jackson and Eleni Sikelianos

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