Grandfather, why are you so bent?
Why are you so wrinkled?
Why are you missing so many branches, so many needles?

Listen to my words my small ancestor.
I once was a small sprout like you,
Looking up at the tall ones,
Asking the same questions.
I reached for the sunshine,
I buried my roots deep within the rich soil.
I tickled when squirrels scampered up my trunk,
And I grew.

Growth takes many, many years,
Patience is our name,
It is the way we exist.
Those who find patience hard
Are those who's roots are shallow,
Those that fall in storms.
I sat patiently, waited, watched,
I lived and learned.

I’ve seen sights you can only imagine,
I’ve lived through fires
That killed many, but I lived!
Scorched, in pain,
But I lived!
I stood through earth shakes
Watched crevasses open
Where none before.

My body shaded fauna, flora.
I witnessed births beneath my branches.
For this, I dropped them
For privacy for mother and child.
I watched this child of life
Slowly rise with the same wonder
Of all young, the puzzlement the wonder.
I watched this small life nurse for the first time.

I witnessed many endings of life.
The acceptance of fate,
The peace within the eyes,
The calmness of peace.
I watched as the life force
Left the body and it sunk slowly
Into the earth cradled for eternity.
I watched as it became one with the earth
Leaving behind nothing but wisps of hair blowing in the breezes.

I’ve watched the influx of the two footed ones
I’ve seen their young Run around my trunk
Try to span me with their young arms and fingers.
I’ve survived while others around me fell to the axes.
I’ve listened to the creak of wagon wheels
Give way to noisy, noxious fumes of motors.
From my topmost branches, I see their homes, their villages.
I’ve seen them come and go, but life goes on.

Every year I grew
From childhood to adolescence,
From adolescence to maturity,
From maturity to old age.
However, I looked forward to the warmth
Of life and the sun.
Each day was an adventure
Each day I heard the glorious voices of birds!

But as I aged, I drooped
From the weight of my own growth.
Now the sun only warms me,
My life’s fluids, my blood runs slowly.
I grow tired.
One of these days I will be as the other old ones
I will sink into the earth
Shrieking with the pain, in protest as I fall.

But from my death will come life renewed.
New life will spring from my rotting corpse.
I will nourish the earth and the fungi that grow.
My body will be the playground
For the young scampering, playing.
When I become one with the earth
I can rest, sleep, dream
Remember.

So look at my gnarled body
Think of the years, the millennia lived.
Each of my fingers reach heavenward
Towards the source of life
My hands maybe gnarled,
But my soul is straight and tall.
In my mind I am young and supple,
Age is only outward.

When I leave this life,
When I am lying on the ground,
Sinking into that final sleep,
Don’t cry for my loss,
Remember the life I’ve lived.
Rejoice in my renewal.
Think of what I’ve told you,
Remember me with laughter.

Grandfather, I love you…