If I were the Addams Family
tree we paid a guy
named Steve to trim and fell, I would brightly burn
in Emily's and Matt's
new old Sixties boondocks home
with its two wood stoves, like confetti I would burst
all over Steve's red face
and his stubby, hungry saw
to celebrate myself, I would calmly face
the twenty-something cretins from the all-night party house
down the street who took
the biggest pieces from my base
and gathered in their driveway,
circling with beers
and axes, wonder-struck by my power and my girth,
yes, I’d shine out from my stump
like the clean face of the moon
and gaze up at the sun, remembering our love-
making without cease,
even in the naked winters,
screaming from my grasping Thomas Hart Benton
limbs and when you leaned into the February gales,
like a lost bird,
you would hear me sing.