On the Edge of Paradise

unlike
        the red maple standing proudly next to church entrance
                her devoted husband on his morning run
        the pair of street-side gnarled trees
                the elderly woman lingering in the nursing home
        branches bare in August sun
                mind bereft of beloved ones’ names
no longer
        shades the parking lot
                tends her family
with its faded lines, weeds, and crumbling
        concrete
                memories

        chainsaw’s roar
                alarm’s eruption
bisects morning stillness
        tree trimmers swarm
                nurses scramble
        gray haired jogger
                son already late for work
picks up the pace
        children cover their ears
                daughters return to bed
not wanting to hear when
        grown-up folly intrudes on their play
                caller id again reads “St. Anthony’s Health Care”
        and trees fall
                and mothers die

        the red maple
                the gray-haired jogger
with
        its leaves
                his breathing
heavy
teeters, topples in solidarity
the Sunday after
        its forlorn brothers
                his demented wife
        are
                is
carted away

        religious seekers
                children
thwarted in their pious resumption of
        genuflections and absolutions
                business lunches and PTA meetings
        chip and mulch
                weep and rend sackcloth
until
        it
                he
is also erased, leaving
        the religious
                the progeny
to cling to their crumbling
        concrete
                memories

©2019 Kenneth W. Arthur