Life is the years between
The most significant events
Birth, your beginning
Death, your ending
But the stories are between

What competes with the two?
The encompassing emotion
Describes and combining them all
Launching ships, leading men
To live and die for

It makes both such trivial matters
Like life or death, pale before it
Such is love, such is life
A story of two made one
It's the heartbeat made crazy

Her kiss, soft on the lips
Her smile, just as soft
A sparkle in her eye
When she grabs you
And pulls you close

The warmth she feels
Safety in your arms
Great protector, everything
And giving that much more
Than ever, never alone

Stroking her hair,
Running gentle hands
Along her body
And her heat against yours
To give and be life

Between those moments
Of birth and death
Writing the story
That defines life
Making it alive

Crooked tree, misshapen thing
A hundred years old, if a day
Tall, but not a branch straight
It's bark at least two inches thick
But it's bite was the cloying sound

No birds hung among its leaves
If one might wrap its little feet
Too often the bird was there
Maybe it's little, tiny feet wrapped
Then it wasn't, a motion too fast to see

Bees would him around the orchard
Spring would ring the sound of blossoms
So many insects would sing along
But on the edge of the field
Would sit the tree alone, without

If there was a tree that might
Look out and see the world
And horribly seek to darken it
Even it's leaves, grown, were black
Dead before they dropped

The tree lived, broken, and older still
Birds learned to avoid it,
And insects, they never did
Creatures, feeding it's hunger
Disappeared with quickness

Then a day came, the orchard mowed
Trees trimmed, five by twelve
Blossoms sparkled across the trees
And eventually, the tenders came
To the orchard's final tree

It peered back at them, ringed
Looking at bones, a predatory cave
Even the grass didn't grow
And the tree felt at them with need
It was thick and sure it could take one

But moments went and they were far
Just beyond reach and just too many
They looked, unsure of life
The tree with an ancient cunning
Made a frightening sight

Toward it's top
Just out of reach
What might have been
Ruby, red flowered
But, ******, not ruby, spread

Before their eyes
The blossom went
From flower sent
To apple of ****** spent
First, one; then two, and three

Enough for all, should they reach
One, first stepped, a hand stopped
Pointing and excitement gripped
Gesturing at small bones, evidence
The tree, made apples blazing red

Words were spoke and those, left
The tree, still crumpled and bent
Night fell and the tree felt
Leaving apples up, so so red
A worthy tempt

And right before dawn
One did come, temptation won out
The man, climbed; the tree stood
Held its ire, back it's threat
Waited until, the man out stretched

Snapping him up, quick, quick
Swallowing him whole, spitting out bone
It was such a meal, that the tree just grew
Another inch, or maybe two
Up, and out, roots reached another

The tree spread and spread
Turning green apples deep red
Less slowly it went,
One lonely man a day
Until it made two

And now, the tree leans
Never green, overgrown hollow
Infected, bringing red to green
And might thoroughly explain
Why wild apples all, are sour

The finger of the shade curled
Not so much a beckon
As a warning, unsafe path

From the trees a wildcat screams
A woman's wail, shrieking
Unintentional ambiance
A deeper black to the night

The fade sees, hollow eyes plead
It's mouth works, a soundless scream
The shade chokes, tries to breath
Forgot it's dead, it remembers death
Insubstantial hands grab my chest

Snow falls, the land in fog
A tree falls, unseen far off
A giant's step, shakes the earth
The shade reaches in, grips

My heartbeat, rushing thudding
Stops, fear's fingers tighten
Clench, stilling the drum