For some reason I got enspired to write before bed, here's what I got. I haven't written poetry in awhile but I think I struck something good here....

The Old Maple

Once there stood a maple tree.

It was tall and grand

It’s arms reached out like wooden arms

And It’s trunk was thick and Deep

When I was a child

I would swing underneath its shady branches

Singing my favorite songs with Dad

The basket swing would creak and sway in the breeze

The old maples strong arms held the old basket swing tight

Wind would caress my face, swinging free

The old Maple saw my first friendship

A summer afternoon

Two young boys

Swinging on the tree

The tire swing flying high into the air

Pushing, higher, highern higher.

In the fall it would drop thousands of colored leaves all over the lime green grass

The painter’s palette of leaves would crunch under our feet

We would rake them into giant piles and jump into them crashing and crunching

The Old Maple shielding us from the gray skies

In the cold winters

It would watch us as we built snow forts

And sledded down the giant mounds of snow

And when Night came

The old tree watched us walk into our warm homes and shake off our snow covered clothes

Eventually there was no tire swing, or basket swing

No leaf raking or snow fort building.

Only an old Maple Tree looking on

It’s ancient limbs becoming aged and weak

One day the old Maple was gone

Cut down to nothing but a stump of rotten wood

The yard where we played as kids seemed so empty

And the Old Maple which watched us grow up was gone.