Once, on a hill far far away
There stood a tree,
In the wind it would sway
Wildly and completely free
Then came the king,
A thousand men he would bring,
To cut down the forest and collect the wood
But the tree remained, strongly it stood.
The king told his men to build a castle
Fit with a golden throne,
They managed to build it with no hassle
A place they could call home.
But even after the forest was gone
And the king’s men ravaged the lands,
The tree still stood not even worn
All hardship it withstands.
Hundreds years went by,
The king was long gone,
In his place came the French,
In the king’s blood they would drench.
Then came the English,
They took the land through conquest and war,
Then Napoleon and his army would extinguish
The flame of the British next door.
Another hundred years passed,
And the tree still lingered,
Even though the lands nearby were harassed,
It still never trembled.
Even after the Kaiser and his men,
Turned the land into a wasteland,
And even when Hitler did it again,
Through hardship it would withstand.
The land was filled with craters,
A hell surrounded the hill,
Even when under the control of kings and dictators,
The tree stood healthily still.
September, 2025
