A stand of trees
you know the kind,
a golden grove,
a farmer’s pride.

Are now but stumps
with greening sprouts
that struggle upward
to find some light.

Gone the careful line
along the lane
the cluster’s done
and so the shade.

I oftentimes came
to sense the souls
that rested there deep
below those pines.

More than trees
they seemed to me
a hiding place
for things I need.

I’ll not be dreaming
among those trees
with hands on bark
looking up.

There’s nothing left
but tangled floor
and nothing gained
but these metaphors.

“Epitaph,’’ by William Hall, a Rhode Island-Florida-Michigan-based painter and writer