Computer Poem for Mary Ruefle

Picture Mary Ruefle in a forest, alone, her hair nestily

arranged by the birds. Wearing what? A gold wood 

grain and a few green leaves. "I have been in the forest 

for forty years, it is time to send a message to the out-

side world." She takes her knife and carves a computer 

completely out of wood. She raises her hands to type 

a poem. When the poem is finished she "prints it out" 

on a piece of paper still inside a tree. "Now I need 

an email address," she thinks. "It is after all the Modern

Day." Many places in the forest want to be her email

...............address but after much thought she chooses

ababysparrowopeningitsbeaktogetaworm@arealtree.com.

She sends the tree with the poem inside it to The faraway

New Yorker. "I'ma gonna pooblish this," says Paul Muldoon, 

running a hand thru his bangs! "I'ma gonna set this poem 

to music," he says, and starts strumming a guitar that is 

still inside a tree. Inside the tree feels like it's ROCKING 

OUT and it trembles like a thing in leaf. Sasha Frere-Jones 

reviews the song, he loves it so much and he says it sounds 

"like worms being dropped in the mouth of a sparrow, except 

this is a metaphor, so the worms are notes and the open mouth 

is the public's hunger for excellent music!" Mary Ruefle receives 

news of this in her email inbox. "Thank God for the internet," 

she laughs, and by internet she means a living tree 

...........sucking silver water up itself from the rained-on ground.