Xylem Radii.

How sober of the trees to grow so slowly. With crooked, sap-carbuncled trunks, they dot Field purlieus in lincoln silhouettes. They have amassed no appetite for answers But feel thirst only and are satisfied To lord above their shoots until they shrink Aside the equal shoulders of their offspring. Looking up, beneath the first few branches Through child eyes, these pinetrees have no tops. Through endless spokes & broken branch cams, rooted in Cinnabar needles, brushing the white waxsap, There is no peak in view, no apex to mark. But they burn: they sicken: their odors are heady in death. Felled, sawn, planed, their simple mystery Is bared in loggingwaggons, sliced assunder. Their stripped history is devined by Mill belts, where square, queer jacks Trim them even and stain their edges blue; Their innocence is split with their allure, Bowing to eternal usefulness.