The sun is bright on the morning

my mom tells me she’s taking Daddy

to the doctor for some tests.

It’s a Tuesday and I’m putting my lunch together

peanut butter and banana sandwich,

apple, fruit snacks, cookies.

My mom takes the cookies out, says After school.

When she turns her back,

I put them in my bag again.

What kind of tests?

For the headaches. She looks out the kitchen window.

And the memory stuff.

Guess they want to rule out dementia. I don’t know.

There’s a cardinal at the bird feeder,

then a sparrow comes and a yellow warbler.

When I was a little kid, I used to say What’s that and What’s that

and What’s that and my dad would tell me

the names of the birds.

When I asked him if they would survive

the winter, he’d always say

Of course they will. Mother Nature’s got their backs.

Now I want to ask again, say What’s that

only not about birds this time.

What I really want to ask is

Are the doctors gonna make him better?

and hear my mother say

Of course, ZJ. Mother Nature’s got his back.

The Trees

Maple’s what we call the oak tree in front of the house.

It was Dad who decided to call an oak tree Maple.

There’s another one—a birch he named Sweet Pine.

And out past the garage is a crab apple tree.

He wanted to call it Peaches but I said Nah, Daddy.

Let’s just call that one Crabby.

And in winter, when Crabby’s branches are getting beat

down by a cold wind,

I wonder if she’s upset no one

covered her up with a tree blanket.

It was me who decided Crabby and Maple and Sweet Pine were girls.

I don’t know why.

Maybe because of that book we used to read you,

my daddy said.

The one about the tree that keeps giving up

everything she has.

But I shook my head. I’d never want a tree to do that.

I’d never ask that of anything. Or anybody.

Daddy has to stop playing football until the doctors know

what’s going on with his head.

Some days he seems just like that tree.

Like he’s not his whole self anymore. Like one by one

somebody or something

took his branches.

Daydreams

In class, from somewhere far away

I hear

someone calling my name.

I mean, I only sort of hear it

because I’m not really there.

Outside the classroom window, the sky

goes on and on and on, and

I’m wondering what happens beyond it.

Is that heaven up there?

And all the people

who left us, are they really walking around

and looking down? And if they are—

what do they see?

What do they know about stuff?

Last night I found my mom outside