I am trying to output the contents of a simple xml file to my left hand menu, but cannot figure out how to get the elements to display. my xml file is like this..

<mlx>
<link tab="Support" view="Search" title="Search">
<description>Search our Help Articles</description>
<header>0</header>
</link>
<link tab="support" view="someotherview" title="next view">
<description>example description</description>
<header>0</header>
</link> 
</mlx>

i was thinking I could do like this but its not working. 
   my $xml = xmlFileData("Content", "mlx.xml", "mLeftIndex()");
    $xml =~ s/(<\/leftIndex>)/$logoutLink$1/s;
        $xml="<\/leftIndex>";
        $str .= $xml;
        last SWITCH;
        
      }    

    }
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xmlfiledata is a subroutine that sets up xpath to the file in question it takes as arguments $path $file and $caller