From sunrise till the sun dies
sits the old man by the evergreen.
A wiry husk of its grand title,
its leaves dripped off drooping branches
and crumbled atop the old man’s shoulders.
His wrinkled wrists racked against the wooden bench,
his hunched back against the plaque
whose engravings dug into his spine as if to
to take his bones for its collection.
This once was evergreen, as green as
his sheen when he could still see.
It was his favorite, where once his bare feet
crunched against the earth, cool in shade
of life and air.
He thought it
green as ever, here,
where he could feel the sun’s caress, hear
the neighbors’ kids play, near
the cement pathway, where
the whole world intersected to get a
glimpse at the old man and his evergreen.
Decades and decades hence,
empty air grazes the empty bench,
wood sweltering without shade of skin.
Dust cakes the planks where he once sat
and the fibers begin to melt into heat.
His evergreen is bare and broken,
never green again.