Poet Republik-Brenda Coultas

The intersection of nature and technology is a place inhabited by poets. Whitman created links in his poetry between ancient religions and modern technology, Yeats questioned the worth of technological advances famously in “The Second Coming,”  and now we have Brenda Coultas and her tree. In order to see technology from a vastly different perspective think about how you would describe the world if you were a bird? a rabbit? a pampered dog? a cockroach? or whatever. Or just enjoy the beauty of this lovely poem:

My Tree

I found a pearl and wore it in my ear
Deep ocean echos sing like a seashell

A girl promised a purse filled with jewels, if I would be her friend Purses open secrets as priceless as pills in a jeweled box

Loose pearls, enough to imagine what a great loss that necklace was or was not

I like to see metal turn red and glow and to hear its hiss when it meets the water. Leather bellows, suspended from the ceiling, pump air into the fire. Long handled tongs and picks forge mostly nails. I open all the old purses. There might be change left in one.
I built you a tree of light to see by
To listen to digital libraries in your palm.
Renamed myself writing this book, renamed myself after building this tree

I burnt candles all night to grow these leaves.

I fed books to the flame, to make a blaze to read by
Mined libraries to power this tower of light

built sparkling branches
with flaming pages for leaves
dense as the weeping willow’s cascade of curls

On the mountain ridge my tree stands head and shoulders above
the hardwoods. Along the roadway wooden poles, bathed in chemicals, hold up a network of wire

I built a tree, more cell than sweeping pine or black walnut, as natural as pink pine needles or a silver mylar holiday tree. Glittery pine boughs glue-gunned on.

No needles on the floor
No forest smell

My gift is glittery and eternal
Even in synthetic shreds
dumped on a landlocked city sidewalk
it finds its way to the sea

Brenda Coultas is the author of four poetry collections, including The Tatters (Wesleyan University Press, 2014), The Marvelous Bones of Time (Coffee House Press, 2008), and A Handmade Museum (Coffee House Press, 2003).

Her honors include a New York Foundation for the Arts fellowship and residencies from the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, the Emily Harvey Foundation in Venice, Italy, and the Millay Colony for the Arts.