work in progress

This is the latest in my series of city poems. It started out as one poem, then grew into two when I added this wierd tree metaphor. I wrote them simultaneously and decided to merge them at the end since they covered the same topic. I had a sick thought as I was writing that this is a lot like twisting songs in EQ but that's too distubing to comtemplate further. Anyway here it is, and i am taking commentary but please be constructive. No "You suck stop writing!" I know I'm not Robert Frost here, I'm just trying to do this as well as _I_ can.

the trees, dome shaped piles
of leaves, not a single branch
breaking free of the pattern
lining each glowing green lawn.
this was no place for a gnarled
sapling like me to plant root.

(the streets were scrubbed
and newly paved with glittery asphalt
storefront windows windexed
to a reflective shimmer
bouncing off the chrome visions
of cars in the parking lot
blending with dark blue
heavy wool famous label suits.
I never saw a neighbor walking
only the windshields
stopped at a crowded traffic light.
such was main street.)

i stayed potted, moving
through this plastic forest
straining to push my tendrils
through the ceramic and into
the all giving soil. each time
i touched the surface, it pushed
me into retreat, hardening
against my veins.

(YOUR storefront signs are dingy
and fading from red to white under
the summer sun. YOUR streets
are broken into pieces of loose
gravel and beaten dusty snow-covered
cars fight like swordsman for a spot
in traffic, or a resting place. wanderers
who have not touched their skin to water
this century crowd your doorways
and I stepped in something in harvard
square but I don't ask what it was.
such is my town.)

here i reach dig my veins into
the center, i pull
life from the earth beneath.
here i stretch my branches
and grow uneven and boundless
among the mom and pop shops
and my two million neighbors.
here I can kiss the dirt
ridden streets, touch
the sides of subway cars
and own a piece of the city.

work in progress

This is the latest in my series of city poems. It started out as one poem, then grew into two when I added this wierd tree metaphor. I wrote them simultaneously and decided to merge them at the end since they covered the same topic. I had a sick thought as I was writing that this is a lot like twisting songs in EQ but that's too distubing to comtemplate further. Anyway here it is, and i am taking commentary but please be constructive. No "You suck stop writing!" I know I'm not Robert Frost here, I'm just trying to do this as well as _I_ can.

the trees, dome shaped piles
of leaves, not a single branch
breaking free of the pattern
lining each glowing green lawn.
this was no place for a gnarled
sapling like me to plant root.

(the streets were scrubbed
and newly paved with glittery asphalt
storefront windows windexed
to a reflective shimmer
bouncing off the chrome visions
of cars in the parking lot
blending with dark blue
heavy wool famous label suits.
I never saw a neighbor walking
only the windshields
stopped at a crowded traffic light.
such was main street.)

i stayed potted, moving
through this plastic forest
straining to push my tendrils
through the ceramic and into
the all giving soil. each time
i touched the surface, it pushed
me into retreat, hardening
against my veins.

(YOUR storefront signs are dingy
and fading from red to white under
the summer sun. YOUR streets
are broken into pieces of loose
gravel and beaten dusty snow-covered
cars fight like swordsman for a spot
in traffic, or a resting place. wanderers
who have not touched their skin to water
this century crowd your doorways
and I stepped in something in harvard
square but I don't ask what it was.
such is my town.)

here i reach dig my veins into
the center, i pull
life from the earth beneath.
here i stretch my branches
and grow uneven and boundless
among the mom and pop shops
and my two million neighbors.
here I can kiss the dirt
ridden streets, touch
the sides of subway cars
and own a piece of the city.