Populus Tremuloides Three

Populus Tremuloides Three
© 2026
Edition of unique artists book
Dimensions in inches (closed): 14.5 x 5.8 x 1.5

Materials
Book: starched book cloth, ink, acrylic, paper, colored pencil, laser toner, fusion foil, mica, plant specimens, leather, dye, steel, magnets, wax, book board

One in an ongoing series focused on Populus tremuloides (aspen trees), Populus Tremuloides Three adapts a Zen Xian Bao (Chinese Thread book) structure to present Tanka poems, essays and free verse. Each of the five rectangular origami trays hold a map folded sheet with an essay flanked on either side with free verse and an aspen bark specimen. Attached to either end of the trays are masu boxes, each containing a Tanka poem and aspen leaf specimen encapsulated in mica. The fifteen collapsible trays, designed to be easily removed from the cover for display, are housed in a leather cover with strap closures

Full text:

**Populus tremuloides 3 -

Ten Tanka - 5-7-5-7-7**

Pressed against the bark,

my ear chilled in autumn air

I hear something old,

a distant, murmuring thrum

of an ancient way of life.

Elderly aspens,

roots reaching beneath the trail,

under granite stones,

below remains of critters

who once romped among your groves.

The sound of aspens,

whispery, gentle rustling,

between soft and quiet,

a syllable the forest

has been voicing for decades.

In winter, stripped bare,

the white trunks merging with snow,

bleed into pale skies.

It is hard to say where trees

end and where cold skies begin.

White bark catches light

in the cold autumnal dawn.

Vast hillsides turning

to trembling shades of yellow

briefly breathtaking, then gone.

I count the black scars

along the aspen's pale trunks.

Elk scrape antlers here,

leaving signatures behind

on this bark that holds all marks.

Underground roots speak

in a language they have used

for thousands of years.

What looks like a single grove

is one body, breathing slow.

After a wildfire

the aspens are first to rise.

Pale shoots push through ash,

the earth remembering green

before skies have fully cleared.

Other trees grip stone,

refusing to bend in wind.

The aspen gives way,

and in that graceful yielding

continues on, reaching sky.

When I am long gone

the aspens will still quiver.

The same roots, new trunks.

Their murmuring continues

in quiet, loving voices.

**essays paired with questions**

***Living Bark***

Unlike most trees, aspens photosynthesize through their pale bark, the chlorophyll in the living tissue just beneath the surface catching whatever winter light reaches the grove, converting sunlight into sugar and sustaining the tree through months of dormancy. Their reflective coat prevents the bark from warming too fast on sunny days or cracking in

night freezes.

Dark knots mark the bark

at varying heights. These marks, called lenticels, are self-pruning scars; wounds that never fully close. Technically, they are pores, part of how the tree breathes through its bark, exchanging gases the way leaves

do in summer.

Other wounds tell different stories: elks rub antlers, leaving vertical gouges; moose girdle trunks by feeding on strips of bark; humans carve initials.

The trees that survive

these onslaughts build around every scar, making injury part of their permanent record.

**living bark side panel questions**

In winter when bark becomes snow

and snow becomes sky,

does the aspen dream of its own edges,

or has it forgotten it ever had any?

Do the black scars on the pale throat

hurt the aspen still,

or has it learned to wear its wounding

the way winter wears its silence?

***Clonal magic***

Aspen groves spread primarily through vegetative reproduction, or cloning. New growth emerges from a shared root system; an underground network that functions as a circulatory system. When one stem suffers drought stress, nearby stems channel water through root connections. When one section of a grove is damaged, surrounding stems accelerate their own growth.

Some root systems have survived climate shifts that drove other species to extinction. Some root systems are estimated to be tens of thousands of years old. In spring, the grove coordinates its own leaf emergence; in autumn, it coordinates the withdrawal

of chlorophyll, causing all stems to change color simultaneously.

Once fallen, an aspen continues to contribute to its colony: fungi sprout from softening wood, followed by beetles and salamanders. Seedlings of fir and spruce use the rotting trunk as a

rich foundation for their own ascent.

***clonal magic questions***

Who taught the aspen to remember

what the glacier forgot?

What does a root know of centuries

that the trunk was never told?

_______________

**
Cycles**

The seasonal cycle of an aspen grove is one of the most visible phenological clocks in temperate mountain ecosystems. Spring catkins emerge before the leaves — long, drooping flower clusters that release pollen into the air before foliage has developed to obstruct its movement.

Aspen is dioecious, meaning male and female flowers grow on separate clones; pollen must travel between genetically distinct groves, sometimes across valleys,

to achieve fertilization. Sexual reproduction is relatively rare; most new growth comes from root sprouting. At high elevation, where the air is thinner and growing seasons shorter, aspens colonize slopes that conifers find too exposed, growing in bright bands along the mountainside, visible from miles away.

Each morning within the grove, dew accumulates on leaf surfaces, refracting early light and briefly stilling the canopy with added weight. Then the sun rises higher,

the moisture evaporates, and the trembling resumes.

***Cycles questions***

Do groves speak only of wind,

only of light,

only of the long life

that needs no name to continue?

________________

**Never Still**

The aspen leaf is engineered for movement. Faintest of currents cause the leaf to whirl and flutter; groves are in constant motion. Each leaf is two-toned. The upper surface is green; the underside a paler gray.

In wind both surfaces

quiver in rapid alternation.

Spring leaves emerge, folded and sticky with resin, then

unfurl into the brightest yellow-green of any temperate tree, nearly translucent in backlight.

By midsummer they deepen into a richer, waxy green,

and thicken, ready, for the work of photosynthesis.

By late summer, colors shift to yellow, just a few at first, then rapid change cascades through the grove.

At their peak, leaves are a golden hue that seems to generate its own light. The gold then fades and shifts to pale brown, the leaves curl at the edges and fall, carpeting the ground in material that will decompose through winter and return nutrients to the roots.

***Never Still questions***

When hillsides burn

gold in October

do they grieve

the green they once were?

________________________

**Thrivers**

Aspen groves spread primarily through vegetative reproduction, or cloning. New growth emerges from a shared root system; an underground network that functions as a circulatory system. When one stem suffers drought stress, nearby stems channel water through root connections. When one section of a grove is damaged, surrounding stems accelerate their own growth.

Some root systems have survived climate shifts that drove other species to extinction. Some root systems are estimated to be tens of thousands of years old. In spring, the grove coordinates its own leaf emergence; in autumn, it coordinates the withdrawal

of chlorophyll, causing all stems to change color simultaneously.

Once fallen, an aspen continues to contribute to its colony: fungi sprout from softening wood, followed by beetles and salamanders. Seedlings of fir and spruce use the rotting trunk as a

rich foundation for their own ascent.

***Thrivers questions***

When trees lean toward each other

to share what the sun provides,

is that generosity

or simply what is

necessary to survive?