RECIPROCAL NATURE PROMPT
These Roots Grow Wider and Deeper Still
We all have roots yet plants grow the real deal
Reaching beyond the point where the soil ends and the rock begins. Tiny roots expand into every crack available. Roots slowly grow with seemingly endless patience. Letting anything that wants to dig beside it, dig. Fungus, worms, grubs, and moles, help the tree to do its bidding. This tree plans to be here for a while.
Roots holding tight to the stream's edge. Blizzards with their heavy load of snow weighing on those strong roots. Some of the tightly held earth is washed away by those life-giving waters as they melt in the spring. Roots feel the frost then freeze and thaw. Surviving the ice and spring floods. Holding tighter with exposure to the elements over long stretches of time. Sun-bleached grey during years of surviving half torn out of the ground.
Some roots are saw-cut smooth for the comfort of humans walking up the river bank.
Some roots can’t find anywhere else to go.
The root cap is being pushed ahead by the growing apical meristem. Cells inside the roots forward marching parts constantly reproducing. Healing themselves of the inevitable damage from a life of digging. Growing root tissue anew. Sensing moisture and electrolyte levels as it pushes ahead for the plant’s next drink and meal. Always reaching further until stopped by a solid rock or the inside of a plastic pot.
Round and round they go.
Filling in every possible space. Hoping to break free. Dreaming of clay pot shards flying while tiny roots reach for freedom into the life-giving soil.
Another tree’s weakened roots give way to the combination of strong wind, wet soil, and the weight of wood and water.
Roots tearing out of the ground. The force throws up clods of soil and muck. The tree’s trunk fell with a deafening thud. Worms quickly dug their way home. A bunny is already sizing up an addition to her mostly subterranean home.
Holding tight to its home ground, another tree’s roots help hold the soil safe from erosion.
Knowing without thinking, it is hanging on in all the right places.
Thank you, Dr. Preeti Singh, for another thought-provoking, Reciprocal Nature Prompt, ‘roots’. Just like the roots themselves, the prompt responses may go in many directions. I am looking forward to reading them.
I don’t know much about my family’s roots. I do know and am proud of the fact that my family would not be here without its roots. Ancestors who have come here from all over this planet earth and survived much adversity to grow me and my relatives. I do honor and respect my roots even if they mostly stay buried below the surface, doing whatever they may be doing down there.
Dr. Preeti Singh asks a question about our roots and gives the needed information for participation in this or another of her wonderful nature prompts…
Joyce Nielsen digs down to her ancestral roots…
Monoreena Acharjee Majumdar sings in roots…
Thanks always to the editors of Reciprocal, Sahil Patel, Yana Bostongirl, and Dr. Preeti Singh.
