Tree @Botanical garden

The tree @Botanical garden

The tree stood there silently.
There is a circle around his roots,
so that no one can enter.
There is a barb wire on one of his low hanging branches
So that no one can sit on it.
He could not bear the noise around him,
But he was old now and like any old man,
nobody was paying any attention to him.


He couldn't remember how long it has been
Since he had been there.
Some white man wearing khakis had planted him
Along with his friends.
His friends who wished him happy birthday
on any random day in a year.
who cracked jokes at his enormous girth
who would clasp roots just like best friends clasp fingers
 But most of them are gone now.
One by one, they were taken away.

There were new trees
where his friends who used to stand.
First, he ignored them because of grief, anger, pride
how can they take his friend's place.
Now, they ignore him
because of generation gap.

People come, people go.
Some see, some admire.
Some pee, some ignore.
This silence has been a long one.
He wonders if anybody
will talk to him ever again.