Empty

Year by year, day by day,
The tree gave all its fruit away. ǀ Fine
The people passed, time and again,
Tasting its light—an endless when.

The tree came closer to the ground,
As higher branches raised above,
People received, not looking back,
Not thanking once for what they had.

Until one day, when empty leaves
Were everything the tree could give.
Exhausted, old, it bore no more,
It’d given all its life, its core.

Hunched to the ground, it could not raise,
And all they saw was only waste;
Ungrateful, they did not blink twice
As they each passed by what was rife.

And the old tree was left alone,
As dark engulfed the light which shone,
And the old tree looked back and thought:
“I’ve given everything… My all…

I’ve given, yet I’ve not received…
I thought of them, as I believed…
What I have done, I will recall
Till the last breathing in my core…”

Da Capo al Fine

– Patricia