from "Seen Through a Maine Window" by Katherine Higgins and Christine Bulmer-Gilley

Walking By Pru Beal's

I thought

Aren't you lucky to have birches?

And near the window too.

We have evergreens

and when they're crowned with snow

they soften winters frozen face.

We've tararaks that fan the sky

until, at autumn's end,

they brazenly slip off their robes.

and we have elms

that leafless look like wagon ruts

hung out to dry

But you have the birches,

lithe limbed, pristine white

dappled with mascara,

breaking the monotony

of green and brown.

Aren't you lucky?