To be, Dead Tree: A Projection

By Urvish Lodha

To be, dead tree: a projection 

the forest burns a nasty green 

rumbling like a scream upstream 

trapped against the glass of a greenhouse  

and I take circles like a lifeless soul 

hunched, collapsing to the floor 

heart all wild and weedy like a water snake 

watch it glide across the expanding lake 

the lowland flooding without break 

and I too leak now as I thaw 

why, peace be a statue still; cares, koi in the pond 

repulse the rocks, a pulse to storm and control to rage 

clean shot in a marble head, yellowing with age 

I sprout vines, my lime to breakage; o, line and 

conceal my pupilless eyes 

aghast, a field of vision; purple grass to blazing skies 

exchange of waves that grew to part 

a break of skull and brain apart 

I lay forgotten by the grunting stream 

and I am the tree, I used to be; the saucer of the sky 

rattling the table; I sang every sigh 

and all my attachments, they fainted like the sea 

but like a sheet of glass, Istand

you reach to feel me with your hand 

I pray touch may change my opacity 

ye a dancing bird, with wings of peace 

and eyes of hurt that burst a plum in person’s face  

and I cannot compare with such that softens tree by day 

every yellow bone and tooth 

nay, left not to rot uncouth 

do me as you would what you see me be 

as the greenhouse of my chest 

turns every bud and bark to ash 

I sob a little of my fate, then dissolve to carving brash 

nothing will be of my woodpecker pointed pleas 

if I am to be what is wanted of me, and misery 

shall affect not any with judgement of the dead.

By Urvish Lodha