This Burning World: The Life of a Tree

This Burning World: The Life of a Tree
by Dan Ankers

When I was young for a tree, the little boy, his seed still barely opened
used to use my branches to express his fledgling life
just swinging all day, and trying to find a way
to go higher on his ropes and seat, made from one of my friends
who gave his life to lend.

When he swung, it reminded me of myself,
always wanting to go much higher, reaching toward the light of that big
life-giving ball of light in the sky. However...
it took me many years to learn this,
but though we may yearn...this life
doesn't allow us to fly or jump or grow, or by any other means we may go
upward toward
that sky, without consequences
And the energy it takes to go there is monumental.

That boy, that boy though. He always was a dreamer. Much like myself.

Years later, when the boy was gone, and the house that he lived in was too
and the world around me seemed to grow darker, with change
I heard the humans call this a city, which used to lie in the distance, but now it was surrounding me
not quite pervading the soil and the air directly at my roots and branches, but its stench was close enough
and though it had some beautiful parts, one of them was to bring more humans close by
a bad effect was that the air was hard to breath
and my soil was not as nourishing as it once was. And
I missed that boy.

Years later, he even came to visit me, but all he did was talk to a small box that I knew to be a phone, from overhearing them talk (the humans). He screamed at somebody, and he seemed drunk. It was sad.
My little boy. His soil was poisoned too. His roots were all caked with regret. And anger.
He screamed and that was enough to make me want to topple over and just die. The fear in his voice. The sadness.
He fell onto me, and once again, I supported him.
Then, he left, never to return again.

The city is encasing me now. I'm suffocated by its smog and its negative life-styles. There are a few bright spots, here or there. Children. Mostly children...but they grow up to be adults. And most of them end up just like that little boy.