TREEHOUSE POEMS: PLANNING FOR A TREEHOUSE and MARIE IN THE TREEHOUSE

PLANNING FOR A TREEHOUSE

(Voices from Three Generations)

(For my Grandchildren)

1.

Come summer, we will build
another treehouse on an oak
overlooking the creek, there
is more of you now to gather
remnants we can put together.

Nothing bigger, but higher,

maybe closer to the clouds,
nearer to the stars, away from
the giggling girls next door.
We will see less of the world.

2.

Or more of it below: yelping
dogs lining up for the lift-leg
tree astride our river bank,
are easy slingshot targets off
stouter, steadier branches.

O, and there is soldier-boy

doing it with the wife round
the clock since he came back
wounded from Iraq, Libya,
and all on the eastern crack.

3.

Shush, buddyboy, that’s not
what treehouses are for. What
are they for, gramps? To espy
on sparrows, robins, jays, owls
talk to each other on sundowns.

 

So, if we build it a bit higher,
we can also build a treehouse
for God, can we not, gramps?
Why ever for, laddie? He is
everywhere. But nowhere near?

4.

Cool. A treehouse for God on
the river bend. Then, maybe,
just maybe, we can visit him
anytime, gramps, ask for help
for starving kids in Somalia.

Hook him up on a telephone

line, strings and cans and all,
and maybe Dad can provide
Him with a Bell Internet link,
alert Him on the Facebook!

5.

So he can stop all killings and all,
and punish priests who molest
altar boys and girls, and...Whoa!
Whoa, boys, we are building a
treehouse, not His jailhouse.

Could we build one for God,
anyway, gramps? We got boards
and plywood and shingles and
nails, and...borrow mom’s cross,
to protect Him in His treehouse.

--- ALBERT B. CASUGA

 

MARIE IN THE TREEHOUSE

It was the prayer he chuckled about,

that he make it intact to the top
rung of the rickety ladder: writhe,
ride on the wind, old man, be stout
heart, bring her up to His little shop.

She let out a shriek of eager delight.

Abuelo with the creaking kneebone,
gramps of the war room treehouse,
catcher on base, top worrier on site,
cradled her, still as a graveyard stone.

A lass let loose in a toyland’s house,

she skipped and twirled and looked
around, her eyes darting from wall
to wrapping wall, wondering perhaps
what was grand about a dingy nook

emptied of a dollhouse.  Why crawl

through an elfin door, or bother at all?

--- ALBERT B. CASUGA