Trees are referred to at several points in the novel. The chokecherry tree (a cluster of scars) on Sethe's back suggests the need to emphasize painful experiences. Sethe keeps referring to the tree on her back in her conversations with Paul D. The scar on Sethe's back is a reminder of the deep sorrow of her past. The fact that it is on her back is important because it is always with her but she can not see it, in much the same way that her sorrow is ever present but constantly pushed aside and ignored. There is clearly valid reasoning behind Morison's choice to shape Sethe's scar into a tree, and she describes it appearance with graphic detail as 'a chokecherry tree. Trunk, branches, and even leaves. Could have cherries too. This description creates an image of life, a blossoming tree in springtime, but Sethe cannot feel it because 'her back skin has been dead for years. This is similar to Sethe's emotional life; although physically alive, she has been emotionally frozen or dead since she murdered her daughter eighteen years before earlier. The trees at Sweet Home are a source of shelter, comfort and protection (e.g. Denver's boxwood emerald grove). Paul D also has memories of trees under which he would lay with Sixo and with whom he would go to see the thirty-mile woman. Paul D's preoccupation with the earlier Sethe and the disappointing sex in the present emphasizes the constant intrusion of the past into the present and its ability to shape and undermine characters in the present. Amy Denver and her quest for carmine (red velvet) is very similar to baby Sugg's demand for coloured cloth "simple demands after a life of hardship. The butter that Halle smeared on his face is relevant to that fact that he watched his wife's milk being stolen. Beloved's memories of the "dark place- from which she came can be taken as those of a deceased infant girl, but they also greatly resemble an African woman's memories of the crossing of the Atlantic on the way to America.