El árbol Muerto- A Memoir

By Shaunak Bakshi

s I swayed gently in the wind

I knew it was time

ground littered with dead leaves

a September to remember for a lifetime

the memory of last spring

still fresh on my mind

as I obligingly bent sideways for the wind

while my branches creaked and whined

I smiled a smile

never wavering and self-indulgent

because the fact remained

that I was free and independent

I knew that the last leaf

was going to leave me soon

and wished I didn’t have to say my last goodbyes

in September, but in June

the wind died for a moment

as if in reverence, and unlike Macbeth

you could smell it in the air

the stench of fresh earth, of death

as I tilted with a jolt

roots uprooting, my tether torn

parting words never uttered

my support system gone

so my sideways descent began

while the sky lit up with orange shades of dusk

my very own funeral pyre

my body just a husk

and the chirping of birds

and rustling of dead leaves

seemed like the best sounds to give in to endless sleep

as my still green leaf grieves

so as I closed my eyes

after giving the world one last blink

right before it all disappeared

to an orange smudge did it all shrink.

By Shaunak Bakshi