Pruning
We
have to prune the tree,
the
crabapple tree,
the
only tree in our front yard.
We
have to trim
those
big dead limbs that arch
improbably
high – what
kind of tree is that?
–
though thank God not over the house.
And
still spring’s dense white blooms
came to fruit
the
size of tennis balls, dropping
hard
now at summer’s end.
The
dog mouths them,
the
lawnmower chokes,
flies
gather in the sweetness
and
unexpected heat of autumn noon.
We’ve
put it off, afraid
to
do something wrong,
cut
ourselves or bleed the tree,
but
each leafless branch
makes
us wince,
and
friends and neighbors
say
it’s time.
-Hope Jordan
Hope Jordan's poems have been published in such
journals as Many Mountains Moving and Green Mountains Review;
and her fiction appeared in the anthology Scream When You Burn.
