Gleditsia & Grape

Now Noah,

a man of the soil,

was the first to plant a vineyard.

For M. L., in vino amicitia

Gleditsia, your trinity of thorns
Lash out from trunk and low branch to brandish
Engagement with wilderness. Each cluster warns
Deer and hare off. So the world would wish
It found your shade without a penalty
To touch your textured bark, partake of your pod,
Subsist as Christ’s cousin on your honey
Imbuing locusts with a taste for God.
Ararat’s slopes were thus as glad to cede
Grapes their vines, a weave of older testament
Restoring balanced thrift with vintage bliss.
Arbors throve thus on thirsty sediment –
Provided Noah quaffed enough to guess
Exactly what the taste of blood would need.