Warm Breeze, Mid-Afternoon in Mid-Winter

At the walnut tree’s highest reach
the day’s breeze sets twigs and thin branches

tense like frantic lost messages, last waves goodbye
but the slur slows through the random knots

and twists of the limb structure and’s spread asunder
further in by the outward-reaching limbs and widening

resolve of main branches to the absolute breaking
of leftover negative space: down where I am, humming

a tune I heard my beloved sing and will not forget,
just my voice in the quiet, here at the trunk where all is still.