The Bottom Shelf Review

Lórien’s light is a golden-silver, shining through its leaves.
Watching the world spin round I fear I never could, but she finally leaves

the world, that thousands of years never dulled her love for,
to go to rest in the land of her maker. But she’ll never forget her golden leaves.

From Lothlórien she handed the wanders a gift of matching brooches
For their hearts and elven cloaks of dark, dark green: leaves.

They traveled to a place where a man once walked beneath the trees and even talked with them
but now logs fall and he grins as smoke rises from the Fangorn leaves.

I grew up walking through the pages of Middle Earth, curled in my father’s lap.
Curled up in his arms is where my love grew for spine-bound leaves.

My father’s parents entered the world of Middle Earth first,
while reading aloud together on a sailboat out at sea. Were there any leaves?

Thanks to them and thanks to Tolkien, every pebble-bedded stream and ray of sun,
songs, prayers, brilliant people, and trees, they always remind me of those leaves.

Those that might grow from Samwise’ seedlings and the laughter
of Rivendell that brings back the elven youth of Nessa, and it never fully leaves.