unable to grow while hidden away
it resists a kind of seedness whose integuments
deny a crown fire its forgetfulness
opens remembering what comes in a dry wind
roots withstand (among the buried) to stiffen
& increase in distance what rings this presence
this that endures the flourishing
until the one seed's bright tree perishes
& in its place gathered against the dark
accumulation of weathered rock
(what one ring after another had gripped
surrounded with a sunny insistence)
a soul surrendered--ready to bear the buried
