The piling up of words into units, struc- tures, towers, is what might be termed the phallic unity of lang- uage. It was Hulme who said...

A Twisted Tree A twisted tree from sapling green to creek-brown god, nature's will has bent its back, perversed its proper shape: Roots that will not hold, leaves that cannot bud, encircled by the serpent snake -- a canker in the lifemilk's sap, and in the viper's blood.

Tree, 1943 My roots are split & my bone-bare branches brittle. I degenerate in a cruciformed landscape. There are many like me. Perhaps it’s a sign of the times. Woodcutter says we’ve been marked out for timber or burning. The genus, it seems, is being hewn.

The Chad-Cameroon Oil Pipeline Project And again: the thud of executions echoes in the green ear of Maboula, Cameroon. The tremendous squeak of the assassin's blow and the axe cleaves the trunk: the first bite travels down the core like electricity through bone. The wood rings out dull music, a drowsy monotone. A loud creak and the sky topples; a tearing tumult of raindrops, leaves and twigs. Upper kingdoms are disturbed: birds disperse and disappear with the passing clou