When is a Lime not a Lime?

Back, again, to the copse.

Ian, a Wild Mentor, had seemed skeptical about the lime ID. As it was he who alerted my to my ivy error, I was inclined to listen.

So I returned and inspected the trunk of a tree still standing.

And then I looked at its crown.

It has to be said that these trees don't look entirely happy.

I took off a twig and inspected it. This told me little. But something drew me to smell it. The leaves gave off a wonderful odour. I'd have it as a perfume.

After the copse, I went to the definite lime trees and plucked a twig. So different!

On the right is mystery tree, on the left the lime.

And, what's more, no smell.

I looked through my tree book and nothing sprang out. So I Googled 'which trees have scented leaves?' And the Woodland Trust replied black poplar. Look at the link and check out the leaves! But note that it says this: .Imposing, elegant, rare. The black poplar was once a staple of Britain’s landscape but these days, the trees are few and far between.' So... who knows?

Ian expressed doubt, due to the trees' rarity. And it turns out there are schemes to reintroduce the species.

Thus is seems somewhat unlikely that I have happened upon a patch of these. Ian suggested Aspen - but the strong scent of those leaves just.... I suppose that Balsam Poplar is also a possibility. The Woodland Trust do not offer any information about it.

Now, I had been listening to a series of lectures given by plant expert Stephen Buhner - and in one of the lectures - I THINK it was the Tuesday one - he said that when you need then, plants call out to you. Yeah, woo-woo nonsense, but then I wondered if this mystery tree reflected my current state of mystery.

So, I did some black poplar research.

This part is science: 'black poplar buds are a valuable and important source of bioactive compounds responsible for a wide range of therapeutic uses, being a promising candidate as a complementary and/or alternative source for a large number of health problems.'

Now for the.... less scientific part. And this covers all poplars.

Poplars, it turns out, are associated with CAPRICORN (the Crone's star sign), with the white being masculine and the black feminine.

Then I found another website. Now, in a conversation the other day, I had said, that I spend my life ’skirting round my shadow, always in the penumbra, and I never ever go through it’… so, how’s about this:

I’ve come to know Poplar as one of the mystery medicines. Poplar is enigmatic and oracular; able to act as a healing guide into the darker places within us. During the winter it is easy to observe that Poplars are dark and witchy trees with their gnarly jointed twigs, dormant leaf buds pointed and in small clusters on the branch tips reminiscent of little demon creatures claws. Dwelling on the interface between land and water, these trees are magical; shapeshifters. The perfect medicine for winter time shadow work. As guardians of the watery realm of emotion, Poplars can help bring light to the darker parts our of selves. Poplars are symbolically associated with fear. Highly sensitive, fluid and responsive, the slightest breeze makes them tremble. The trembling itself doesn’t harm us, rather it releases us from fear. It is a primal impulse to a stressful situation. Animals naturally shake to release tension after a life-threatening event. It dissipates stress and helps the body to return to living in the moment. Unfortunately as humans, we’ve lost so much of our wild, primal instinctual nature. We’ve been socially programmed out of this natural way to recalibrate our nervous system. In our modern world, we don’t really have a rubric on what to do with our emotions when they arise. Most of us have been encouraged to repress our feelings from a very young age, trapping the stress within the muscles, tissues, and organs of our bodies. This holding on to trauma in our bodies results in chronic emotional and physical tension, and mental distress. It is often accompanied by a sensation of being immobilized by our emotions. The unreleased energy makes us more hypertensive to stress, and we can become frozen in a sort of anticipatory stress response. In this state the even most minor stressors can easily upset us and at times trigger a sensation of fear that is largely out of proportion to the stimulus of the moment. Sitting with Poplar this winter I was begged the question “what is on the other side of the thing that you thought would break you?” I’ve had to meditate on this question for many weeks, returning to Poplar again and again to find an answer. And in the end, I think the simplest answer is “my self”. “Someone I loved once gave me a box full of darkness. It took me years to understand that this too, was a gift.” – Mary Oliver On the other side I will know myself that much better, and become that much closer to experiencing a wholeness within myself. By facing my fears, I am holding space for the darker, more uncomfortable parts of my self, and in doing so I can begin to hold space for those parts in others too. Evolving my potential as a healer, and creating a medicine in my character so that I may be of service to others. What I’ve come to know about fear as I move through my life, is that the courage to face fears is found in desire to live in and embrace the full spectrum of experience life has to offer. Courage and be found in the desire to evolve ourselves to our highest potential and make the most of this one precious life. It also can be found in the desire to heal, for when we meet our fears and hold space for them, our bodies may begin to let go of stored trauma, and feel at ease and present again. Working with the spirit medicine of Poplar can help transmute deep emotional pain, and bring in adaptability, lightness, and change. It can help us to face our fears by helping us move through the dark sticky spaces that lay within us each of us. And like the shimmering of the leaves in the slightest breeze, and the dropping of branches in the wind storm, it can help us to release those fears, shaking off and leaving behind what no longer serves us.

Cooler still, the blog is https://ravensongherbals.com/blog-post/poplar-medicine It’s another corvid!!! Though not an exact crow… Given my situation - decision time on the future of courses and volunteering and so on, this too is encouraging: 'the Poplar tree appears in Celtic Tree Astrology as an emblem of confident choices, creativity, organization, reliability and trust.'

Obviously, I have just bought a job lot of black poplar tincture. Though perhaps I really should have opted for Balsam Poplar - Balm of Gilead.