The creaking in the branches spoke of days now long since past

and the wisdom of its age drawn in the shadow that it cast.

Its head peaked out of the bracken before Cook sailed the sea

yet we had the audacity to say that it was ‘just another tree”.

It stood for many things in life; and worlds long gone as well

but now it stands within the lines plainly marked “Clear Fell”.

And so the life that was so true and the creatures that it held

will simply feed the chipper once its beauty has been felled.

The life living within its fold and all that crept and flew

will die to wipe the arseholes of arseholes like me and you.

Then all us sanctimonious arseholes will flush it down the loo

and build another Estate where its wonderment once grew.