Who could resist falling in love with this tree? I took this photo while viewing some of the temples in the Angkor Wat complex, Cambodia (2006).

This is a tree,
its limbs reaching high.
Once it flourished,
now it's doomed to die.

The buds sprouted early,
then the leaves -- red and orange
Brought color to the tree,
that mighty, solid, symbol of me.

Yes, symbol I say,
for I too stand
Quietly peeping
at that thing called Man.

My leaves fell away,
blew to distant lands.
There to be picked at
by unfamiliar hands.

I too stand naked
in the breezy night air.
Gazing at the stars above,
striving for the beauty
so far out of reach.

All gnarled and dry,
it heaves a mighty sigh.
We're one, that tree and I,
for both are doomed to die.

Republished by Marilyn Paluszak in 2020 from my original poem written to accompany a college writing assignment in 1966.