Jambul tree

Jambul tree

Jambul tree

No one knows who planted her
inside the church compound.
She grew and every year
the schoolboys waited
for the fruit that never came.
One young priest-in-charge said
“Cut it down!” but luckily,
he left before the idea spread.
The birds and boys soon found
that she had other uses,
there was constant rivalry
between the two –
when birds built higher,
boys climbed higher
and the jambul tree grew.

Until last week. . .
there was a storm one night
that pulled her roots up,
threw her right across the road.

Traffic stops.
Birds perch grieving
on the grotto railings,
everybody comes to see
what they can get. . .
Boys retrieve
their hidden treasures,
poor people gather twigs,
and finally, they chop her
into bits for fuel
load them into lorries. Look!
That one has the carving
of initials in a heart,
with an arrow through it.

The road is clear again.
The grass begins to cover up
all traces of the jambul tree
that bore no fruit.

I had an aunt, once, like that.