The Old Man and the Tree

The Old Man and the Tree

The day Jack Brand was born the topsoil moved

Aside, displaced by gentle force, nature's

Relentless strength when roots split free and taste

The goodness of the earth. The willow tree

Emerged some six yards from his future house.

The boy was strong, with sturdy arms and trunk,

A cold blue stare and willingness to fight

In schoolyards or the street. The teenage Jack

Could take a pint, wore hobnails on his feet

But missed the war. (His birthday was too late.)

The slender sapling meanwhile swayed and waved

Its kitten tails and braved the winter winds

And with the spring fresh green re-dressed its wands.

Beneath the clayey soil its spreading roots

Anchored and fed the lean and thirsty wood.

The bull-necked and be-suited Mr Brand

Could drive a car in nineteen twenty five

And travelled as a salesman selling seed.

It was a man's world, though, in certain bars

Professional ladies with their stone-eyed smiles

Were cheap, but smelt of stale cigars and gin.

There was a decent girl with perfect teeth

And eyes like Myrna Loy who could Charleston

Well and waltz. Her father was a policeman

Who sucked his pipe as Jack, with polished shoes,

Asked for her hand. In nineteen thirty four

He marched with Moseley sporting a moustache

And starched black shirt. His wife polished his belt.

The willow grew, and took strength from the soil.

Still thin, but thickening, its swaying dance

Seen from the kitchen of Brand's future house

Entranced the occupants when March winds blew,

And perching on its boughs the garden birds

Sang summer through. Striations in the bark,

Marked the unique skin like fingerprints.

Its pale charm brought to mind, somehow, moonlight

Reflected on a lake, enchanted song.

The neat suburban garden's modest scale

Was able to accommodate the tree

Despite the undulations caused by roots

In the shaded quarter of the lawn.

Throughout the Second War (too old to fight),

A comfort for our absent soldiers' wives,

Jack prospered on his travels, while at home

His son and daughter thrived on rationed food

Well-supplemented by black-market goods.

Complacent Mrs Brand at length decreed

That on cessation of hostilities

Her well-fed brood required a grander house.

Thus in nineteen forty five, the willow tree,

Though not exactly property, became

A part of Mr Brand's enlarged estate.

"My salix alba," he would proudly boast

To friends and neighbours who admired its grace,

But even as he said it some unease,

Some vague sense of resentment, unexplored,

Would creep, or seep, like weak acidic sap

Until that faint distaste showed in his face.

Lofty now, aloof with hefty boughs

And roots that nudged the path behind the house,

Its bole too thick to sway, the willow tree

As each season passed would leave detritus

On the lawn: browning, lance-like leaves and twigs,

Then catkins in the Spring. Out with his rake

The portly Mr Brand would sniff disgust

At his careless rival's shrivelling gifts.

But then one Autumn, in the fading light

He felt the chill of age, both children gone,

His ailing wife half-lame, his greying hair

Less thick and looming smugly over him

That solid mass of thriving, sappy wood

Rustling crisply in the evening wind.

A bully's first experimental nudge,

If answered with a shove, evaporates,

But when Brand accidentally grazed the bark

With a clumsy rake, impassivity

Was taken for contempt. He was nonplussed

Momentarily, then he drove the tines

Hard at the earth and if they hit a root

That was too bad!

                                 When we moved in next door

The octogenarian widower

Nodded but turned his back and did not smile.

At length, however, ice began to melt

With pleasantries exchanged across the fence.

I praised his garden, with its moss-free lawn

And he complained about a neighbour's cat.

I said that I admired his willow tree.

He spat, which shocked me, gave me a cold stare

And spoke at length about the scourge of trees:

Their roots, which undermine his property,

The nuisance of their leaves, but most of all

The threat of death they pose on windy nights.

I, disconcerted, smiled and humoured him

And kept off the subject as our friendship grew.

Our politics were worlds apart, of course,

But I was fascinated by his life -

So different from anyone I knew -

As over beers watching TV sport

He repeated stories from a bygone world.

Then one evening as I bathed our child

I heard my wife come rushing up the stairs:

"That fascist from next door is up his tree!"

The light was fading. Clouds of grey-blue slate

Leant colour to the foreground. In the wind

The willow hissed as lambent yellow leaves

Shook free and swirled like streamers to the ground.

An aluminium ladder gleamed against

The glowing, grey-green trunk. High on a bough

Jack Brand, with silver hair, black, polished, shoes,

Suit trousers and white shirt with rolled-up sleeves

Sat legs astraddle, working with a saw.

A creamy dust was bleeding from the cut.

"Are you OK?" I called. "Need any help?"

Like a man possessed he pushed and drew and

Pushed. His face was red. He gasped and blew and

Gasped. A crack. The bough before him shuddered

Then ripped itself away. His ladders fell,

Swatted to the ground by the swinging limb.

Exhausted on the stump he dropped the saw

And slumped. "Hold on!" I cried, fearing the worst.

"The ladder's gone! Don't move." I leapt the fence

Retrieved the steps and leaned them where I could.

Climbing up to Brand past the sundered wood

I smelt and touched the willow's gaping wound.

"Squirrels," was all he said. I helped him down.

There was a smell of whisky on his breath

But in his eyes I saw a wilful boy

Who, pleased with what he'd done, could not conceal

A gleam of triumph. Yet his reluctance

To meet my eye showed some embarrassment

At having to be helped down from the scene

Of his artless crime. A tear in the clouds

Exposed a Hunter's Moon. He shook my hand,

Assured me he was fine and took his leave.

That was the last time I saw Mr Brand.

Botched prostate surgery the following week

Led to his sudden death. His house was sold,

The landscape gardeners felled the willow tree.

We moved away, but in my memory

A man with silver hair in chill moonlight

Still hacks at innocence in lonely spite.