Poem for the Day

The Last Tree Standing

Earthbound, the last tree stands.
You look up, a fleeting shadow crosses your path.
This tree is one of life's tragedies, quietly
tempering itself to be alone. What else can it do,
but drip leaves, wait for shattering rain,
watch its forebears roll past? A rumbling sound
disturbing root and twig. Double lorries
trussed with logs, a girth as wide as a stone
Hercules might roll. Relocation, destruction.
The space will bear out: untidy hills, poor drainage, salt.
'They don't tell us everything,' a contractor says,
painting a house in the street. A new house
spacious, alum roof, cream brick, concrete.
What have we become "cutting timber",
to mound wood chips, to hone tabletops
for the rich to panic birds?
Still, the one tree stands, mocks us with its
artistry, noble shade; its boiled sap
hearing the woodcutter's saw. Thinking
of an old land of wallaby, bilby, bandicoot,
a cooler time with every bird singing.