of Trees

Ifeoluwa Ayandele

Don’t call me broken because I write my father into this poem & carry borders on my shoulder girdle & pray I will understand the truth about

Christmas trees. Last December, my father grew a Christmas tree in our front porch & lit candles around it & asked me to dance around the light,

for herein lays glory. My father says trees are the glory of man & god is the glory of trees.

I danced around the Christmas tree like boys

scout around camp fire. But I didn’t know that every initiation begins with a dance & the road to glory is in the skin of brokenness. Meanwhile,

when I carry my skin across foreign borders, I carry a Christmas tree in my eyes, for my eyes have seen 3

the glory of rebirth & I become the son of glory who

listens to the light of grace in his father’s voice. Later, before my father becomes an icicle on the Christmas tree, he says grace is found in the fellowship at home

& your sparkles won’t be under the feet of strangers who don’t know how your backpack holds the memory of how you danced around lit candles to find the magic of trees.