Roses will not bed
beneath your fingernails
for classes devoured.
Rather, an oak rises
by the too-lively lawn,
or the half-lived apartment,
or the not-lived job,
where summer enfolds you
like the hands of a feverish God.

The branches dance ahead,
then tap
past your window,
your shirt, your skin,
your soul,
to reach your heart.
A saccharine sap
steeps your chest.

The heart of a tree
is dead,
and it's the same
for us.
Yet nature leaps on you
like a prowling heat,
and she reminds us
that when we fill ourselves
with alcohol and love,
when we swallow the doldrums
of courses and self-immolate
for jobs,
and when we accept another's breath
but keep our own,
we are stirring what's dead
to life.

An oak grows the same
as you.