Thinned Larch, or
What If a Body Lost Its Leaves
Needles storm weak,
wind bent, sky turned,
it lost everything
again, barked spire,
stone pinched,
roots a plate
chalky with want.
It nearly wasn’t,
just a rock lip
where the wind caught
part of the world,
thin enough
to hand cut, arm
to trunk. Bone soft,
it broke clean
again and again—
by Michael Goodfellow, from Naturalism, An Annotated Bibliography, Gaspereau Press, 2022
from Autumn Sky Poetry DAILY, January 5, 2012
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