This beautiful and established tree at the corner of Humboldt and Government Street by the Visitor Information Centre adds beauty, character, charm and works 24/7 for no pay cleaning the air, absorbing excess water and providing habitat for birds, yet, like the stump next to it, is slated to be cut down to make way for “improvements.”

We are losing our downtown trees at an alarming rate. Our natural environment is one of the main reasons people love our city, however, it’s disappearing before our eyes. Thank you to everyone who has written Letters to the Editor and to council. Please share this if you agree we need to work with nature, not against it. Replacing a mature tree with a sapling is counter productive when a healthy, thriving tree already exists.

sqəlélŋəx̌ʷ – tree

by Nicole Moen

I sit downtown listening past the roar of the traffic
The human voices
The rumble of heavy machinery
To sqəlélŋəx̌ʷ the Lekwungen name meaning ‘tree’, I’ve given to the tree in the intersection of Government, Wharf and Humbolt.

Here’s what sqəlélŋəx̌ʷ says to me:

This grey sky matches my mood today.
I’ll tell it to you straight.
I’m sad.
I’m sure you can see that in my branches and the abandoned dangle
Of last year’s lights on my bough-arms.
I know what’s going on
Please listen:
I’ll see you bike lanes
And raise you a question
What if you created a bike-friendly space
And ditched the bike-perfect lanes?
My roots would support that
Like your roots support you.
My crown could oversee this scattering you envision
I’ve been doing that all my life anyway.
Why stop now?

Why WOULD you stop me now?
Why would you cut my life off at my waist,
Bifurcating my light from my dark?
My life from my bark of protection?

I’m an elder in your midst.
But like with so many true elders, you simply see me as an older
And pass me by.

Your generalized policies dismiss me as an individual with equal right to life.
“We’ll plant two trees for every tree we cut down.”

Sit with that for a moment.
Pause right here.
How does that really feel for you? For me?

– – – – – – – – – – – – – –
I return to my own thoughts for a time and remember
That John Muir said that “Every tree calls for special admiration.”
I notice my agreement as I think of sqəlélŋəx̌ʷ.
As I sit I take the time to notice her minutia:
The taper diameter of her trunk
How each branch carefully extends away from the others
leaving each one space to grow.
The variations of paper-whites and earth browns on her bark.
Hopeful leaf buds – thousands of them.
Each waiting for just the right moment to come out of hibernation
And open to the nourishment of the sun.
On your north I detect a yellow-green micro-forest of lichens and mosses.
In my mind’s eye I remember her in full leaf over the 30 springs and summers
I have walked by and shared breath with her.
I am humbled by my privilege when I think that no one has ever tacked a
“Woman Removal Notice” on me.
Or, maybe an ex did without me noticing?
But even if they did, here I am.
Your “Tree Removal Notice” is hidden.
Tucked up on a side I’m barred from seeing clearly.
Perhaps its person is afraid to kill you? I would be.

I wonder.
What does that white painted dot near your feet mean?
Is that the White Dot of Death?
Like a pox?
Infected with a viral case of colonialism?
Probably.

Gazing up from that heart-breaking dot
I look at her crown.
I am reminded of my own nobility as a human, my own sovereignty.
I’m enchanted by her delicate branch tips and seeds . . .
. . . and it hits me . . . she really does know . . . her end is near.
So she’s gathered her energy into a thousand thousand wee flat seeds.
Her fruits
Tiny wing-ed offspring
Hanging stacked together in narrow catkins.

– – – – – – – – – – – – – –
sqəlélŋəx̌ʷ speaks again to me:
Yes, I know.
Can you help me?

– – – – – – – – – – – – – –
I have to admit that I don’t know if I can help her.
I don’t know.
My heart breaks once again for her.
I can write, so I will try.
And I don’t know.

– – – – – – – – – – – – – –
She says:
This grey day matches my mood.
I’m telling you in straight tree talk.
Thank you for hearing me and recording my words.

– – – – – – – – – – – – – –
I bow in reverence and sadness for dear sacred soul of sqəlélŋəx̌ʷ and leave.

Nicole Moen, January 17, 2019