Reading · The Liriodendress

A Collaboration Between Jesus & the Tulip Poplar Tree

Jun 30, 2025

We should start at the beginning, my oldest son said.
We always begin at the beginning, Tulip Poplar concurred.

In the beginning there was
“Jesus Loves Me”
“You Are My Sunshine”
a piano
a guitar
a porch
a choir.

In the beginning there was music,
and the evening and the morning were the First Day.

The end is in the beginning, someone once said to me,
and I can’t unhear it.
I can’t unsee it.
I can’t stop searching for the place where the snake eats his tail --
only to be reborn with fresh skin.
So here we are --
at the beginning
at the end
back where we started
ready to circle round again.
As I begin this musical journey, I sit beside notebooks filled with songs that I have written. Each notebook page is an inked canvas of barely legible lyrics and primitive chord notations. The songs exist less on the page and more in my heart. I’m not sure where to begin.

Tulip Poplar whispers to my heart, Begin at the beginning. Sing us the songs you sang before the singing stopped.As a child in East Tennessee, I sang with my mother. I sang with my father. Together, we sang on the porch, around the piano, in the car, and at church. Whether riding passenger’s side in a pickup truck or sitting quietly while wearing my Sunday clothes, I learned to listen to the other voices and find my note.

The First Song

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