Christmas Tree Poem by Robert Rorabeck

Good men love bad women
And visa versa—this I know- as I sometimes
Kept the feminine serpents
In my house—
But kept my ears to the sunlight, listening outside
To the serpents who measured their bellies
By the ways the grasses grew—
And yet somehow serpents never learned how
To grow fat:
They had bulges when they ate the rabbits—
And the sunlight made new sounds around them
Until they shed themselves,
And then became the failing sunlight around
The carports that only sometimes existed—
As the planets turned inside the ballrooms of their
Satellites—
And she followed her husband to the very ends of
The earth—even though he beat her—
She dug herself out of the grave every morning—
And painted her nails for the mirages of
Skeletons—
And then, even though it wasn't enough—
She pretended to love me, as she left her skin
Underneath the tree for me at Christmas,
As some kind of present she meant for me to have.