Topiary

I cannot know twisted Henriette of the plant kingdom

Engrafted with a crutch. And yet her bulbous concerns

Effuse a solid blue from inside,

Like a steel Dryad, and her gaze effaced

Shines with distended power. Otherwise

These clusterjewels would not dazzle us so,

As limbs proliferate through her pulped brain

From dendrites where creation flared

And this crippled tree would seem defaced,

J’Accuse! beneath the lace of this clipped sister

And would not glisten in synaptic blasts

Would not, from all the reaching boughs of self,

Burst like ripe sapphires: for here there is no place

That does not see you. You shake forth a nest.

Source: Articulated Lair (Subpress, 2012)