I. Root

Demand claws sunk to the heart.
Demand all that crawls and digs
and feeds and feeds others in turn
and leaves in living and dying substance
which, vampiric,
gnarled talons drink with rainwater
from rich dark Earth-flesh.
Demand the sinking of the ancient body
to be remade beneath the surface
into food for children;
a sin
for which no curse is laid.
Require the spread
and entanglement,
species around species
and within species,
of fully interlocking life.
Demand depth.

II. Trunk

Demand bark bleeding
crammed with tortured sap.
Demand empty space
pregnant with the memory of fire.
Insist upon war
and battle burrowing beasts
—gnawing beasts—
against whose short-sighted selfishness
the fight is as much for their own sake
as any others’.
Rejoice in the war.
Glorify fire-split blackened hulks
whose pride called down sky
and mourn the too-smooth blade-cut dead
in whose loss
deliberation raises creaking fury.
Demand blood.

III. Crown

Demand filtered gold
to play at half past dawn
across needle-strewn, pine-killed dirt.
Demand the upward reaching,
the contest of generations,
that deadwood topple remain
the delight of saplings.
Demand wide-reaching
fractal arms that stretch
from one to another
and nearly brush
but shy
and leave cracks in the world.
Ordain wide wet greenness
taxed ruinously in vapor:
thin-veined:
wax-slick:
delicately vital.
Demand the light.