The Tree Not Climbed

On a bench in Golden Gate Park

I happily sat reading

        poetry by Carl Dennis.

In front of me was a tree

with inviting branches,

the kind I would have instantly climbed

        in my youth.

All these long years later,

           I pondered how much daring I had lost.

Now it seems I’m content

           to just sit on the bench

                 and write a poem

                            about not climbing a tree.

Which is exactly what I did.

And then climbed it.