I'd like to begin with a story poem, an old poem.
I grew up where there were palm trees, also.
And it's nice to see them again.
One day, in the palm tree across the street,
I saw a roof rat, which is like a pack rat.
It collects things such as glass and builds a nest in a tree.
And it runs along telephone cables to get to its tree.
One day, the tree was on fire and the fire department
was putting out the tree.
This is my version of what caused the fire.
"Roof Rat."
"When the palm was green and innocent,
she kept you, much evicted tenant,
escapee from poisoned gardens.
You came packing gifts like your own Santa Claus, hidden
like a louse in her thick wig.
You set up laboratory, home, and pyre,
building a shelter that would commit your life like a wedding
ring.
The palm's long fingers could not pry into that privacy.
Not even the sky could bully you.
One day, with the relish of an antiquary,
you carried to your nest a shard of glass, revolving it
like a flower arrangement to find the best angle, letting
the light crawl, bare-rested, and unshoed
across its little furnace.
I watched you come and go, soloing along the telephone
cables, digging your nails into the shredding
shingles of the palm trunk, flicking your whiskers
against its whiskers.
You built as one possessed, belonging to no union.
And though I lived across the street,
you would have none of me, rat aristocrat, penthouse Pete.
Then one day, the sun bore a small twin of itself
on the other side of the glass.
The palm became a blonde, and then a torch of liberty.
I heard your crackling laughter at the fire trucks red rescue,
its hoses sniping at your homemade star, the nova
of your rodents heaven.
Your tree landlady dumb with illumination.
You burned like God in the wilderness bush.
We stood, a mass of Moses's, lifting our feet
on the hot street.
And you burned, untouchable in the locked house of fire,
and the light in our eyes was you."