With apologies to Joyce Kilmer, Toronto homeowner Perry Thompson would rather have a poem in front of his house than a tree.

Many schoolchildren in North America have learned to recite Kilmer's poem Trees, with the opening line "I think that I shall never see / A poem as lovely as a tree."

But for Thompson, the little piece of the urban forest that stands in front of his home near Jane Street and Eglinton Avenue, is costing him tens of thousands of dollars — because its roots are eating away at it.

He wants the city to take it down but the city isn't very eager.

In blunt fashion, Thompson succinctly put his case: "If you had told me a tree could screw you … I'd have taken a bet you were wrong."

But Thompson found out he was wrong. The tree outside his house has cost him $18,000 in the past five years.

"Those roots," he pointed out, "go right down right under the front porch — which has shifted — and right under the basement."

Thompson said when he and his wife moved in to the house five years ago the basement flooded. When they tore out the drywall they found a tree root. They had to dig out the foundation and put in a new weeping tiles and gravel.

Then last year after the semi-retired couple renovated the basement, Thompson says a root clogged a sewage drain, flooding the basement again.

"I'm a tree hugger of the first order but not when it's eating my house. This is a common sense issue. If its costing you money and causing damage to your house  then eliminate the tree. It's only a tree," said Thompson. "I'm a human being, I'm a taxpayer."

But Richard Ubbens of the urban forestry department and the man in charge of the city's trees, says don't blame the tree, blame the drain.

"If a drain is replaced so that it can't leak there will be no roots. You can plant 100 trees around that drain and it won't leak, it won't attract roots," said Ubbens.

City Coun. Frances Nunziata heads the community council in Thompson's ward. The council disagreed with the urban forestry department and voted to have the tree taken down.

"The amount of damage that was done to the house," said Nunziata. "The tree policy is going too far."

The fate of the tree outside Perry Thompson's home, ultimately, lies with city council. The issue is expected to come up next week.

As for Thompson, he's resigned to the fact he might lose and have to continue looking at "A tree whose hungry mouth is prest / Against the sweet earth's flowing breast."