Kathleen

My father often told me of the land he bought
in middle age, though I’ve only seen it in his eyes.
But I’m proud of it and him, and he of it and me.
Four oaks were clustered there like a
family, their thick, straight trunks rising past the
canopy before branching out on their
own good terms. Last month, my now old dad found
three of his oaks cut down by a bloodless surgeon who’d
dressed the scars with dirt. Oh,
how I dread the day I get the same bad news, that another force, quite as
blind, has taken my father, by the roots, from me.