Came down hard in back, casting bomb-

like shadows over one wall through a window.

Took out a corner of the gutter. Just a limb,

it looms larger than whole oaks out front.

The free man isn’t built to move it,

even were his belly not an awning,

his back not bent like a camel’s.

knees not in pieces in their skin.

During prison years, this wouldn’t have concerned him

any more than fire, flood, or bear attack,

though once he saw black water spewing from sprinklers

after a quarter-century of resting in the lines.

It was a rain of corpse-water—sickening, probably

choleric. He couldn’t fix the sprinklers, &

he can’t fix this tree. Perhaps, he thinks,

he should’ve taken that prison chainsaw class

when offered. No, that wouldn’t do back then.

He didn’t trust himself with a blade,

his history full of clumsy hands &

bad intentions.