I was sixteen when the machines came.
The letters “C-A-T” screamed at me from across the street
As the harsh yellow tore at the roots of the
Cherry trees across the street.
Of course the orchard had never been mine,
I had not planted the seeds and curated the
Beautiful blooms through their short lives,
Picked the cherries off the trees myself.
But what about all the photoshoots I’d done
Among the gorgeous white blooms,
All the times my friend had walked through
The rows of trees to get to my house and
Left paint splatters of cherries across the kitchen floor,
All the sunsets I’d seen through the leaves
That made me nostalgic for things
I had never experienced?
What if I’m growing up and moving out
And can’t seem to wrap my head around the fact that
These plants that have smiled at me from my
Window for over a decade have returned
To the Earth?
What if these days the
Weeks are crying when they should be glowing and
The absence of trees is simply the target of
One of those odd tricks that sorrow shoots out of the mind
That remind me that change is the only thing that’s
Permanent?
I wish that the emptiness of the field could be replaced by
Happy little white blooms
But instead the CAT machines screech and moan
And all I can feel is
The ache of old nostalgia and the
Peculiar nostalgia of the unknown.