Sonnet

When your days are ended and you are laid to rest with your ancestors.
I will preserve the offspring of your body after you.
Our own predecessors were our investors.
And at our end we will be too.

I was looking at the old White Mulberry Tree in St James Park.
Its ancient trunk potted with crown gall disease and held up with a stake.
Tired and gnarled was its bark.
How long had it stared placidly at the lake.

Impervious to all the great history it had witnessed.
The Kings and Queens walking by.
By time only and not by regret or ambition was it stressed.
Held by no man in any subservient tie.

Yes it is only a tree.
But it is free.

Haiku

The Mulberry Tree
Ancient placid and free
tree but what am I