She Was the Fig Tree

"A man had a fig tree. It looked dead to him. It seemed dead to her. "Cut it down," he said. "Burn it up," she said. And with that, they found an ax and were about to begin."

******
She was the fig tree.
He was the ax.
Waiting with hands gripped white and arms extended.
Taller than normal, they were never meant to be.
Smaller than the rest, she became winter's past.
Breath crouched under tender bark waiting.
Hidden and moist, held tight for solstice fading.
But he-- with vision short
And she-- with patience thin
let limbs meet the ground.
Metal upon woodland.
Rust and decay.
One they held and one now thrown away.
She was the fig tree.
He was the ax.


  

I Am Water

I.
Cold to hot and then back again.
I am a faucet fickle in temperature and pressure.
The gentle push of the hand and it burns
but to pull it toward the center brings coldness once again.

II.
My face pressed agains the pitcher still.
I am water-- soon to be poured out and consumed.
Bubbles form on the inner surface of glass,
microscopic eggs of imaginary life un-lived.

III.
A burp--a bubble inflates curbside.
Aired up for a moment and then instantly exhaled,
Like the neck of a summertime frog,
singing and breathing and looking for new life before it expires.
The rain silently explodes in synchronized beauty as each drop dives into the next.
As I dive into both you and me before we too expire.