











Poison Ivy, I think you know
that you will always be my foe.
I can slice your vine, pal-o-mine,
and still end slathered in calamine.
Because I must haul your corpse away,
and on my gloves your oils will stay —
waiting that unexpecting day
when I scratch some tender bit.

a dead tree
stands above the living;
it didn’t pace itself.

sapling grows in boulder,
splitting it in twain;
paper does beat rock.