The hurricane took the trees.
A footnote to the flood
and devastation in Texas,
but here in Ohio was wind,
such as we’d never seen before.
Wind so horrific it was tangible
to the eyes,
like the voracious stem of a tornado.
So the hurricane had its way
and took the two trees
shading us in our yard.
Where the children had their summer pool,
and we reclined in our chairs
thinking, as life is wont to think,
life never, ever changes.
The trees would always be here.
The children would play
and then go,
but bring back their friends,
while we drained the glass of happiness,
and extended our hands thoughtlessly
for more.
But life always changes,
always opens packages to something else,
and the trees were taken,
toppled by the wind,
sawed into pieces
and put at the curb for people collecting wood.
We retired to our beds
to dream and forget,
and cry a little.
That too is life.
To go on and not hear
the silent swan songs
of the trees that died,
after a day of wind and sawing.
But that night they opened their souls
like children of the night,
not knowing they were gone.
That their shade would never be cast
on the lawn again,
or keep the sun off our children.
Puzzled they looked for each other,
soul siblings,
to play and talk,
as trees talk and play,
but there was nothing.
Then somehow, for a few hours,
they embraced together,
and the night turned away.
Oblivion paused, for there was
some compassion even in oblivion,
for the two trees
who had grown up together,
winter and summer, who
watched stars for thousands
of unshaded nights,
and they moaned.
I could swear,
in my sleep I heard them,
then a rustle of leaves,
as if their sound was entangled in green.
Then slowly it dissolved as if it were one,
and the sky reached for them
in an instant of pity,
to put them in another place,
another constellation
where there was room,
and I opened my eyes in the darkness
wishing them farewell.
Grateful to the sky that I would be able
to see them again,
the trees I loved so much
on the shore of my dream.