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An Ode to the Peach Tree in my Neighbour’s Backyard

Words by Shraddha Iyer

Art by Kathy Lee

 

There is a peach tree in my neighbour’s backyard.

The leaves entangling

and spilling

into my backyard.

The tendrils and blossoms, pondering,

only giving

plump peaches to my backyard.

In the summer of ‘19.

Resting its bare beauty in my backyard.

Tall. Abundant. Drooping.

Strong. Home. Stooping.

It welcomes the sunny honey eaters into my backyard.

My mother makes jam standing 

as mothers do and I am watching

as she turns the flushed, blushing peaches in my backyard 

into a scrumptious, semi-solid slump.

She stores the seeds in a lump.

Little does she know about the stump.

 

There was a peach tree in my neighbour’s backyard.

Now. There is nothing.

Less creaking. Less everything.

The cycle is broken in my backyard

and I am blaming

the human race. Industrialising 

and capitalising 

on everything.

 

Dear new neighbours,

I hope you see the genuinity

in these next words. Hearty

congratulations and when you sit in your new yard, with your same old ‘exclusivity’

I hope you remember. You felled my tree. 

You killed my tree.

A soul. Sole. Solitary 

Peach tree.

Shraddha Iyer

The author Shraddha Iyer

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