“Hang” by Shari Jo LeKane-Yentumi

 

Your limbs, they sag, like broken hangers,

frosted with icing and powdery snow.

 

And near your base, decomp is suspended,

a hangover from last summer’s vernal growth.

 

Now fledgling flocks all fluffed and frolicky

hang on, waiting for the promise of spring.

 

Yet stranger fruit have borne your branches

in hangman days of mobster lynching.

 

With roots so deep and a reach growing higher,

you are always hanging in a delicate balance.

 

Though you hang out now in a restful winter sleep,

you always and freely share your many talents.