Because she wants to

Like a bare tree she stands in her naked beauty

Mixed in with the elements raw

Slapped by the wind and washed by the rain

With sunshine warming her bones

She is rooted despite

She is rooted regardless

She lives, loves and breathes for as long as her roots hold her

For as long as nature calls her a daughter, a mother, a crone

Women regenerate often and hard because they have to

In order to sustain life and bare witness to their eternal belonging to

Land and life

Love and loss

Surrender and sorrow

She stands like a bare tree beaten, shaped and twisted by the natural flow of things

But she lives and will bloom over and over because she wants to

Because she is the keeper of it all…the world, nature, land forever and ever