NewVerseNews Monday: CALIFORNIA CYPRESS
by Blair Kilpatrick
A large tree fell on a parked car and another car with the driver in it on Haight Street between Fillmore and Webster Streets in San Francisco on Tuesday, March 21, 2023. Credit: Craig Lee/The SF Examiner
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Green bedroom curtains barely parted frame brown cypress backlit by morning light my gaze passes through narrowed slit like an arrow from within a fortress I follow my eyes in search of a perch in welcoming crook between branch and trunk arms raised up like a supplicant I find myself wedged in tight angled space high above ground look up and down ready to fly or free fall tree fall all fall down Two years later we rise to cold silence water retreating winds now stilled open curtains reveal empty space too much sky where tree should be Our cypress slumps across neighboring fence head rests on rooftop exposed roots remain tangle of brown new mound of green crows and wildflowers mark a fresh grave
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Blair Kilpatrick is a psychologist and folk musician. Her poetry has appeared in ONE ART, MockingHeart Review, littledeathlit, Amethyst Review, and it is upcoming in Syncopation and Soul-Lit. She is also the author of the music memoir Accordion Dreams (U. Press Mississippi). She lives in Berkeley, California with her husband.