dead, starving
leafless.
i can not think
of a use for a tree
but to dwell upon it.

colonize and feast
on the entrails
until it rots from the inside
out.

next phase,
as the sapsucker
pounds upon the trunk
and the discord
reverberates through dense
patches of birch.

but again, i can not
yet think of a use.
the leaves fell five
seasons ago.

and they will not fall
again. cycles end
when outsiders offend.
extricate the sappiness,
feed the larvae,
feed on the larvae.

it now stands on it’s own accord.

awaiting to be detruncated
by some unforeseen force.

frigid, childless
corpse.

a monument to failure,
a centerpiece
of divorce.