OLD MAN WINTER IS TREES

Here are bristlecone pines
gnarled to an ancient
shoreline ridge.
I am asleep at the bottom
of an icey trash compactor.

The trees stifly swap
stories of past ice-ages.
I’ve calmed down, but
I’m still shaking.
A trio of singing
serpenting belts
warble the first lines
of my last will:

Please bury my body
someplace warm.
Use my hollowed head
to haul heating oil
for those without hands.
With what money I
haven’t spent yet,
buy a head stone,
paint it to look like
a large lump of coal and
put it somewhere
someone can see it.