Real Estate
When a house-hunter announced,
“If I lived here, I’d chop
those hemlocks down.
They block the view.”
I wanted to tell him how
they darken at twilight, how
they glow golden in September
and bend with every snowfall,
how at Christmas their boughs fill
our home with their scent.
I wanted him to know
that there is one
that draped its branches over me
the night I stood outside and sobbed,
that it still nods when I speak
while the others stand still.
I wanted to tell him that,
especially that.
Donna Reis