Isolation

From my perspective, I can see everything –
The shifting patterns of cloud-shadows on wheat,
The fracturing of light on crawling cars,
The way people shift their eyes forward as they pass,
Unwilling to see me standing tall, alone, eternal,
as if I mirror their own solitude.
Countless years of putting down roots here
Allow me to know their habits better than they do.
(When they come with chainsaws, they will stand,
silent, absolving themselves of murder – they will
count the rings and know I was always watching.)
Soon, somebody will slow their case of metal
And lower the window to stare, perhaps to see the sunset
through me, made more pure when filtered through leaves,
and I will stretch, and I will shake, anything to lean closer,
anything to feel hand on bark and feel recognition
that my man-made isolation is wrong.
But they will perceive my trembling limbs as a breeze,
Though no puff of wind will push the hair from their cheek,
And they will drive on, like all the others have and will,
Making me just some silly farmer’s shade tree.