Repair

So it comes away in layers, 
flakes and falls like bark.
Not the single slice you hoped for,
not that clean cut you wanted
which, anyway,
is another kind of violence.

It is a sloughing, natural,
a steady easy shed of 
things let go.
The wind will shift some, lift 
the light unwanted, and
the ground will shake some down

but mostly it’s the returning.
It is the coming back that does it,
time and again to the foot of the tree,
to watch its song, to witness the fall
to feel the sap rise in spring.