What exactly are those things in the windows that suggest a tree's branches (upper panes) and a tree's roots (lower panes)? At first I thought they were some kind of hat tree or tie rack, but two of them? Is it just decoration?
They are growing, taller and taller, ugly scaly branches, short sharp ugly green needles.
My piano room. Mine. My piano. I am here in it, pictures of dead husband dead son-in-law failure widowed daughter mentally ill son. How do I deserve this pain? What did I do wrong? Grandchildren, my grandchildren on the piano with me. Healthy, smart, clean and clear.
My piano. I chose it. My piano room, small, mine. I choose the tongue and groove classy paneling, the yellow wool carpet, the green and yellow curtains and they work. Like my mother chose for the living room in the cottage and every spring Amy wipes it down with water and Murphy's Oil and polishes with wax and she plays the piano in the music room "I want to go to Julliard" she says but I know she is not good enough it is not a practical vocation and now she is aimless, widowed, 2 toddlers, her son born after his father died and why can't she be the laughing daughter so young, so helpful?
Photos on my piano that I play every day, of my grandchildren, of my children's happy weddings, of their healthiest happiest moments because of course those define them.
And now JT my "bagman" is long dead and I have been alone alone and the pine trees have begun to grow, so tall. So tall.
But at the cottage with the same tongue and groove paneling in the living room that Amy cleaned and polished my siblings came to me for hospitality, for meals, for cocktails. And then there was Scott and they shunned us, all of us, as if we had not fed their children breakfast day after day all summer when JT had no teacher's income and my brother and his wife slept in, no food in the cupboards and I fed my own family meatless dinners so we could afford 3 extra mouths for toast and honey and cereal and milk every single morning and what could I say I loved them but could not afford them.
And they cast us off. Shut us out. Because Scott is mentally ill. They reviled us.
And every day I play my piano here in my piano room and the pine trees reach up but feel like they are reaching in.
And the new neighbour says the pine trees must go they shade my backyard where I want a pool for my grandson and I am relieved to be rid of these monsters, planted long before my time for whom the street was named that suddenly are growing their scaly needly branches into my brain.
As winter approaches, light washes out early. Shadows grow long and moody. Streetlights droop dull moons over empty streets. Skies are suspended, starless, depressed and waiting.
I walk by that 2nd floor apartment where that sick tree still stretches its dark shadow across what once were our walls. We had our final argument there. Like two angry cats we scratched at each other.
That tree was never healthy. Even in the summer, its growth was ill and stunted. Barely producing a handful of leaves from it’s knuckled branches. Nothing worth raking.
We backed off from our fighting that night. Both considering our wounds. Two black angry outlines framed in the pane. Too dark to continue.
I suppose we became resigned. We knew it was dead. Next to the tree was a notice. The city would be removing it.
What exactly are those things in the windows that suggest a tree's branches (upper panes) and a tree's roots (lower panes)? At first I thought they were some kind of hat tree or tie rack, but two of them? Is it just decoration?
There, on the dining room
floor, a windswept tumult of
swimming shadow
from the big maple.
She is dying.
We have seen the fungus growing on her roots,
brown bouquets in the Fall,
precursor
we believe
to her own fall.
Plans must be made for
removal
though she is beautiful
in her newly trimmed boughs
and comforting
providing midday shade and a
kaleidescope
thru which to view the turning sky.
In the Springs we have seen her
copious offspring helicoptering down
a besiege on the land.
Her land.
"I know she must die,"
I think,
"but I did not want
to be the one
to see it."
Which is what we might think
of many deaths
while beholding these light and shadow
flickerings
here today
and gone tomorrow.
They are growing, taller and taller, ugly scaly branches, short sharp ugly green needles.
My piano room. Mine. My piano. I am here in it, pictures of dead husband dead son-in-law failure widowed daughter mentally ill son. How do I deserve this pain? What did I do wrong? Grandchildren, my grandchildren on the piano with me. Healthy, smart, clean and clear.
My piano. I chose it. My piano room, small, mine. I choose the tongue and groove classy paneling, the yellow wool carpet, the green and yellow curtains and they work. Like my mother chose for the living room in the cottage and every spring Amy wipes it down with water and Murphy's Oil and polishes with wax and she plays the piano in the music room "I want to go to Julliard" she says but I know she is not good enough it is not a practical vocation and now she is aimless, widowed, 2 toddlers, her son born after his father died and why can't she be the laughing daughter so young, so helpful?
Photos on my piano that I play every day, of my grandchildren, of my children's happy weddings, of their healthiest happiest moments because of course those define them.
And now JT my "bagman" is long dead and I have been alone alone and the pine trees have begun to grow, so tall. So tall.
But at the cottage with the same tongue and groove paneling in the living room that Amy cleaned and polished my siblings came to me for hospitality, for meals, for cocktails. And then there was Scott and they shunned us, all of us, as if we had not fed their children breakfast day after day all summer when JT had no teacher's income and my brother and his wife slept in, no food in the cupboards and I fed my own family meatless dinners so we could afford 3 extra mouths for toast and honey and cereal and milk every single morning and what could I say I loved them but could not afford them.
And they cast us off. Shut us out. Because Scott is mentally ill. They reviled us.
And every day I play my piano here in my piano room and the pine trees reach up but feel like they are reaching in.
And the new neighbour says the pine trees must go they shade my backyard where I want a pool for my grandson and I am relieved to be rid of these monsters, planted long before my time for whom the street was named that suddenly are growing their scaly needly branches into my brain.
Scratched
As winter approaches, light washes out early. Shadows grow long and moody. Streetlights droop dull moons over empty streets. Skies are suspended, starless, depressed and waiting.
I walk by that 2nd floor apartment where that sick tree still stretches its dark shadow across what once were our walls. We had our final argument there. Like two angry cats we scratched at each other.
That tree was never healthy. Even in the summer, its growth was ill and stunted. Barely producing a handful of leaves from it’s knuckled branches. Nothing worth raking.
We backed off from our fighting that night. Both considering our wounds. Two black angry outlines framed in the pane. Too dark to continue.
I suppose we became resigned. We knew it was dead. Next to the tree was a notice. The city would be removing it.