avenue, avenue, avenue

i'll name all my children after street
& should it go the other way around:
streets after children. i live 
on an avenue which is supposed
to have trees on both sides but
there's no trees. i say the name aloud
"Avenue, Avenue Avenue!" i say 
it like i'm summoning something &
the trees start to grow from out
of the sidewalk, from in between cars:
their alarms go off so i hide inside,
i don't want anyone to know 
that i did that. i look from the window,
the trees strange & varied. all
different kinds of trees. it's really
just like naming a child, naming
a street. some people probably think
over it for hours, maybe they 
pace the street trying to get a feel
for what it should be called. there 
was a whole neighborhood where i grew 
up where all the streets were named 
after books in the bible. another was
named after breeds of birds. i prefer
the birds: blue jay way, oriole avenue,
condor street, pelican circle. i don't
think a street would ever want to be called
"Leviticus," but you never know. there are
strange streets just like there are
strange children. there are children
named all sorts of things like "trout"
& "john" i grew up on a
franklin street. i could go there
& say the name aloud, a prayer, pacing 
up the winding road. a boy might come,
a boy who the street was named
after or a street the boy was named after.
a ghost or otherwise he would walk 
with me & i would tell him 
that i don't think i will ever have
a street or children to name. maybe he would 
frown or maybe he would shrug,
unsure how to comfort a grown man.
if i were in the right state of
melancholy i might ask him to be
my son. he would, of course, run away or
maybe politely refuse. either way 
i would watch him walk himself
back into the "franklin" street sign, 
pressing his body against the metal poll until
he disappeared. returning home 
to the avenue, all the trees are 
gone, cut down by the neighbors.
i will rename the avenue, but only
for myself. i'm not telling
you it either. &, maybe if years
later i get asked to name 
a human i will tell them 
they are named after an avenue
that no one else knew 
the name of