Tree Ferns

They were the local Ohio palm, tropic in the heat of trains. They could grow in anything—pitch, whole grain, cinders, ash and rust, the dirt dumped back of the foundry, what the men wore home. Little willows, they were made to be brushed back by the traffic of boxcars the way wind will dust the shade of the small part of a river.—They'd go from almost green to almost gray with each long passing, each leaf, each branch a stain on the winded air. They were too thin for rain—nothing could touch them. So we'd start with pocketknives, cutting and whittling them down, from willow, palm, or any other name. They were what they looked like. Horsewhip, whipweed. They could lay on a fine welt if you wanted. And on a hot, dry day, July, they could all but burn. At a certain age you try to pull all kinds of things out of the ground, out of the loose gravel thrown by trains. Or break off what you can and cut it clean.