tree funeral(s)

there were vultures playing video games
in the fields. the morning dew soaked
my feet & i got to school without a face.
i had slathered myself in vanishing cream 
in an attempt at gender sleeping.
out the classroom window they 
put caution tape around the hips of one
of the trees who knew my name. they started
with the arms. i had seen this before or maybe not
i am never sure what was a memory
& what was a fire escape. all day i heard saws.
limb by limb they took the tree apart.
she talked the whole way through it.
i felt useless. how did she come to be so calm
while coming undone? i was almost envious.
i keep falling apar. a collar bone. a hammer.
all the pictures on my bedroom wall falling down
like hail storm or remote controls. 
by the time the school day was over the work
was done. the tree lay in clean-cut logs
in the fields between my house
& the school building. the tree was still talking
somehow even though it was a funeral
& even though my face was coming back
in patches. greasy hair in the cool october wind. 
i brough the tree dandelion leaves & a snipping
of my hair. the tree said, "it is not as bad
as you think it will be." i did not believe her.
now, i am less certain about what she meant.
surely she did not mean to tell me that
it is not that bad when men come & tear you
limb from limb for no reason known to you
or the soil. maybe she meant the whole thing.
the rings & the moons & the vultures still
filling their throats with internet noise. 
i wanted to never go back to school. i kept
asking each tree i knew, "are they coming?"
the trees would not respond as trees do not
usually respond. they mull things over.
the leaves fell. soon, the earth was bare.