The garden hangs outside the door.
I slide, unpeel, it back to see
the evergreen staring back at me.
Perhaps we should cut it back a bit.
We think the neighbours hate the tree;
It clouds their flower beds till noon.
From their room they glare and stare,
And so we don't go out there much, just me.
It always looked alive and well,
But, yesterday, underneath the green I saw
A lifeless, brown, dark, unseen core.
Now she says that she agrees with them.
It'll be cut down to please
The eyes beyond the fence.
Then dragged out past the gate,
To some tree-shredding machine,
Sat outside the house.
Without it, I think,
The garden may well come undone,
And I will have to be the one
To sew it back.
Won't that be fun.
Reviews
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The poem is interesting and unique. It's a little awkward to read because of the sparatic rhyming. It prevented me from really feeling the flow of the poem. In the line "They glare and stare...at it," I really think it would still get your point across if you took away the "at it." Other than that I liked the humor and the picture created by the poem.
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Re-reading the line I agree with you that the "at it" should go! Thanks for that!
I can well understand that the rhyme scheme may throw off your enjoyment of the poem; its my effort to make the poem a little jagged and uncouth in the mouth, but I'm glad you enjoyed the imagery and humor, its nice to know other people see that!
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protector of the forest
GmH,
i read a poem some time back whose topic was "what if trees could talk." surely they would scream when we cut them down. but they can't. they don't have a voice. you are the evergreen's voice, so... stage a protest. chain yourself to the tree. whatever it takes. if you don't speak up, no one will...
i like your conversational tone. only the last line doesn't seem to fit: "Won't that be fun" - it's a cliched term and an after-thought. your poem does fine without it. other than that, a fine poem. perhaps i enjoyed this one because i've spent some time outside this summer. and i realize how under-appreciated nature is and can be. therefore, us nature lovers are the underdogs. yes, nature is a great topic to write poetry about. thanx for this insight.
so, no, i would not cut the tree down.
best,
Pap
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Thanks for the comment!
And if it makes you feel more at ease about the welfare of the tree you'll be glad to know it was never going to be cut down, the poem just sprang from looking at the tree itself
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secret13
August 22, 2008