Build a Tree

[Valerie Please]

In

Build a Tree

I suppose we could 
just keep writing
forever—

wait!

...and continue.
See how it pans out.

Then burn it all away

because we think for ourselves
like naked 
used car salesmen.

I don’t think I got this one on the first read...it comes across as a bit of a puzzler initially...what does the title have to do with the content, etc? But that last simile, the naked used car salesmen is so striking that it stayed in my mind, especially in conjunction with the title. Then it all clicked for me: the creative process as a phony, rote exercise, the mechanization of something that should be organic. The lack of vision and originality that leaves us cheap and ugly. 

At least, if that’s what you were going for. That’s what I got out of it.