trees are hinge-cut
& left to bow
to the wind
to sever
& where the new growth begins
stump-sprouts at deer height
for feeding for thicket building for quail & rabbit to hover
thickets & thickets & thickets through the forest
underbrush to nurture & protect
young leaves the most nutritious
but read on
this is done for hunters bait for a sure thing an easy shot
when the thickets are full
let’s say I could still save us
let’s say at the hinge cut in cross hairs whatever bloomed
would feed us
Ann Dernier is Managing Editor at Kore Press. Her collection, In the Fury (Grey Book Press 2015), was short-listed for the Robert Dana Poetry Prize at Anhinga Press and the Crab Orchard Series First Book Award in Poetry. You can read her poems in Autumnal: A Collection of Elegies, Threepenny Review, Burningword Literary Journal, Poppy Road Review, Weaving the Terrain, Dos Gatos Press. She received an MFA from the Iowa Writer’s Workshop. More at anndernier.org.