Tree Reader
Gabriel Orgrease

In furrowed bark of the old basswood tree as I read an older brother say ten with a younger sister on the train she was all over the place in and out of the seat she fell in the aisle and taunted him then bumped her elbows into commuters who smiled or winced or stared defiantly or shut their eyes to retreat to sleep if they saw nuisance or themselves reflected in their memory of childhood as a climber of trees as he said eat and they ate cold fries and paper wrapped hamburgers she yelped and whined they spilled dark-brown soda while all he wanted was his own seat to sit he pushed her down and off of his head where she grabbed the leaves away from his own room and as the commuter train slid on the iron line further East the passengers thinned out stop by station stop until eventually the young boy got to sit alone he fell over and slept and the ride fell quiet as it passed the old basswood tree in the lawn of the cemetery as I read in the metallic flicker of sunlight on the afternoon window.

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