By SRIJANI ROY
Long ago there was a President
who ruled the country with iron fist.
There also lived a young man.
He was a student at the university.
There was nothing special about this human
other than his love for a Sycamore tree.
The tree was his life as legends said.
He read under its shade
and scribbled poetry.
There was a silent bond of kindred
between the young man and the sycamore tree.
One day, they were told,
The president of the country
was to visit the university.
Over the days trees were felled
to make road for his grand entry.
The last one to fall was the Sycamore tree.
The young man was there.
He didn’t cry nor swear.
But onlookers say
His eyes glistened with a drop of tear.
He vanished for days.
No one knew what he did or where he stayed.
But his poems appeared on their screen
calling for an end to the autocratic regime.
Few laughed but more were moved,
As the poems enraged and the poems soothed.
The young man appeared on the D-Day
when the President was on stage.
He hurled the poems in the air
and the crowds raged
But before he could disappear
The President’s guards tied him down
They dragged him to no one knows where
and he was never found.
But the rebellion spread, a revolution was born
and the President was finally overthrown.
Many years have passed since then
Presidents came and went.
But we still remember
People like you and me.
How a mighty empire crumbled
at the felling of a Sycamore tree.