The little tree of life flourished while the war raged.
She grew right out of a pile of rubble.
Dropping apples against bombs
She grew near the shell of an abandoned home.
She grew after everyone left by dying,
Casting her shadow
Across a few shallow graves.
She blossomed when the front line
Swallowed her whole
And soldiers bivouacked in the foundation,
Sometimes speaking Ukranian
Sometimes Russian,
Sometimes Hebrew.
As the tree of life she hung on
When winter penetrated her deepest roots
And it seemed like Spring would never come.
But in May she grew leaves on a twig.
And when Dylans cold rains fell
She seemed to stand for life itself
Because there was no other life to speak of.
Then one night
She felt her life-force waning.
There was a storm.
She asked
The lightning to take her picture
Like a Victorian photographer
From underneath a veil.
There was a bolt of jagged light
And our anorexic little tree of life
Gave up her ghost.
..............................
Im sorry.
Sometimes there is no happy ending.
But shes not the first tree of life
To fall on our cursed battlefields.
Suck it up.
(Article changed on Oct 22, 2025 at 8:22 AM EDT)
