Allée

Spring blood
rises in dark
bark of dog-
wood trees;
their crooked
fingers flex
at the warmth.

Knuckles crack,
fall off, off,
down to pile-
drive into mud
flash-frosted
with other 
such sticks.

Building grounds-
men rake
them into 
a mockery
of falls,
summers, stunned
by the volume.

Squirrels jump,
shake shattered
copses, scatter
un-hoarding seeds 
of September
with shivers
of March.