Trees

Trees. Such beautiful creations. They fascinate me so. When I look at them I feel each one has something to say to me. They all seem to have a character of their own. They may look alike at the first glance but every single one is so uniquely different from the other. The way the branches seem to spread makes you feel that they carry their signature on them.
I have watched this neem grow for the past five years. When I saw him first he was a tiny puny one, may be just five to six feet tall with scanty branches peeping behind the compound wall telling people, I am here. Surviving. Take a look.
No bird cared for him except for perhaps the pirinia which would hop from one branch to another just to take a sojurn once in a while.
Come early summer, his leaves would turn yellow and fall off leaving him bare, bereft of whatever charm he possessed.
How many times I have wondered if he would survive to see the next season.
My heart would go out to him when his branches would be shorn off by some unknown hands for whatever reason.
Still he stood his grounds. And say, I withstood this one too.
Now he stands tall and majestic flowering and fruiting at the right time, spreading his branches wide, almost reaching up to the fourth floor. He hosts birds galore, right from the annoying koyal to the booming voiced koukal to the tiniest purple sun bird. The first 'good morning' to me comes from the red vented bulbul perching on the peripheral branch of this special friend of mine. He attracts babblers by the dozen. I have even spotted a lone shikra on him at times.
His green canopy is such a pleasure to my tired evening eyes. I suspect at times he moves his branches to say hello and calls out a silent 'buck up, keep going'!
I dread the day when I might have to move out. I will miss you then my friend, But until then.....