Trees are poems that the earth writes upon the sky – Kahlil Gibran
September – a time of endings and beginnings. The end of Summer, the start of the new school year. The waning of the sun and the first sense of cooler weather. Autumn mornings, leaves turning brown, nights closing in.
How can I celebrate this with the children I work with? 
In some places, I’m bound by a school’s curriculum but in others, it’s up to me and this year, I’ve decided to think about Kahlil Gibran’s ‘poems upon the sky’ – trees.
Trees growing, stretching up and out, sprouting buds and leaves: emerald in Spring; maturing to darker green in Summer; turning myriad colours then falling in Autumn; bare twigs in the Winter sky.
Wood. Twigs. Branches. Foraging for wooden sounds. Making claves out of bamboo and willow. Tapping on trees and on the ground. Tapping our friends’ claves. Making up tree chants, tapping the words then thinking them in our heads so that the rhythms become wooden music.
Catkins waving, blossoms turning to fruits, nuts dropping to the forest floor – new trees in the making or food for squirrels and birds.
Making shakers out of acorns and conkers and dancing, weaving in and out, round and round. Holding hands in a circle as humans have throughout history. Waving clusters of leaves and listening to the rustling sound they make. Crunching through piles of leaves then kicking them up in the air. Stamping, hollering, yee ha!
Singing songs about trees: I Had a Little Nut Tree, My Roots Go Down, Five Little Leaves, Here We Go Round the Mulberry Bush (or the Buddleia or the Wise Old Oak).
Hugging a tree and singing a lullaby:
Rock a bye baby, on the treetop
When the wind blows, the cradle will rock
When the bough breaks, the cradle will fall
Down will come baby, cradle and all!
Rock a bye baby, on the treetop
When the wind blows, the cradle will rock
When the bough breaks, the cradle will fall
Mother will catch you, cradle and all!
Blowing the wind with our mouths – softly, gently – then stopping. Thinking about the stillness of trees. The silence between the sounds that is as important as the sounds themselves. The music.
All photos taken at Westonbirt Arboretum, August 2021
