The Poet's Room

  Tree Frog on a Stick          Mother's Day in the year 2022. Three years of continuing Covid and little contact with family my daughter-in-law came to celebrate along with her two sons. The grandsons  didn't start out strapping. Like all of us they began small red and wrinkled. Fresh out of the womb they'd begun crying to know why they had to leave such a snug home. Now nineteen and sixteen years later they've grown into strapping lads -- brothers two.      After a nice late brunch so that my wife and her daughter can talk we boys exited out the door. Our normal thing to do. When the lads were even smaller we'd leave mom and daughter to talk in a restaurant and go outside. We'd find something like pine cones to throw back and forth in the restaurant parking lot.      This time  I lead the lads on a walk over to the nature conservancy nearby. As usual as we walked and talked these two brothers started teasing each other. The younger picked up a small branch and