A View of History

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Tree standing alone in a field. Photo by Simon Wilkes on Unsplash

I have stood witness to the ebb and flow of history. I do not remember my birth. The earliest memory I have is of humans arriving. They came from the forest and began to settle in the fields below my hill. I watched as they took stones from the ground and used them to hack at my brothers and sisters. They tore them down and built their homes from them. I was not angry; destruction is in their nature, I cannot be angry at nature.

After that I fell into a slumber, I do not know for how long. When I awoke there were more humans, so many more. I watched as they went about their business, coming and going, like the ants that crawl across my branches. It appeared peaceful. That lasted until a different group of humans arrived. They came from the mountains, wrapped in fur, carrying their own weapons of stone. That was the first battle I saw. It was not the last. Looking down from my hill I could feel the heat of the fire which ripped through their homes. The wind carried their cries of death and destruction. Once it was over a silence fell over where their homes had stood. That silence carried me into another slumber.

When I next looked down the humans had rebuilt their homes. Not from wood, but from rock. I watched as they dug and dug. They hauled, hacked and scrapped at the earth with metal tools. I was not angry. But I could not watch as they now tore at the earth itself. I let myself drift off again.

I awoke when I felt scratching at my trunk. I assumed this was it. The humans had finally come for me. They would chop me down like my brothers and sisters before me. All I could see was two humans. They were not hacking at me. Instead, they held hands as they used a small metal tool to delicately carve a small symbol into my bark. I watched as they finished their work, gently kissed, and held one another.

I looked out across the stretch of land where homes had been built and destroyed, again and again and I marvelled at what humanity was capable of. I watched as this pair sat on the earth and put their weight against my trunk. I could feel the warmth radiate from them as they nestled into one another. I looked down on them and I marvelled at what humanity was capable of.