Vandals

Even in this there is violence:

Two broken ‘O’s again turn Hollywood into Hollyweed. A boy sharpies a gun into the hand of a stick parent on a changing station sign. Yards cry RUMP for President, sometimes RUM. I see a boy peeing onto Clinton, dark urine dripping down over Kaine. Subway walls and fences adorned with neon penises and half-legible names. Wrist after wrist after wrist in cuffs above hands flecked by paint.

It is more than vandalism when men pour poison over the roots of trees, a maple greying to make room for Topless Topless Next Exit or Free WiFi, her withered branches crumbling out of the way of a billboard. It is much more when lovers cut letters deep into bark, flicking out wood to expose phloem, shaping letters enclosed with a heart.

A woman scrapes moss from the underbellies of logs, from crevices between stones. She rubs the roots with her thumb to free them of soil, cupping lush clumps in her palms and running them under the water, lukewarm. The woman then breaks the green masses into a blender of sugar and watered-down buttermilk where they bob and float. Blades turn moss islands into viscous living paint. She uses a wide brush to apply the mixture to the sides of brick buildings in broad daylight, mists daily with water, waits for it to grow.

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