The ancient one stood on a bank remote
Overlooking a stream,
Where dark at noon the water flowed
In the shade at its feet.
When clouds of amorous mayflies rose
To dance their hour of love,
It basked in the joy of new growth
And held the spring in its arms.

When thousands fell at Gettysburg dead
And Custer the hatchet felt on his head,
It felt the sun of summer days
And dreamed of its heaven
In the long, warm evening haze.
Its needles were brown
When Kennedy went down;
Its boughs bent with snow
Through the winter sleeping,
When Russia saw Napoleon retreating,
Men starving, freezing, their horses eating.

In time, its branches lower swung;
Its face bowed to its own reflection,
Unseen, unsung.
One night in winter, boughs loaded with snow,
It toppled silently and slow,
Roots tearing frozen soil,
Long branches crushing ice,
Penetrating the stream's muddy bed--
Sprawled, face flattened, feeling freezing water,
Finding its end.

Spring's flood rocks the carcass,
Lifts, tugs at limbs submerged,
Sways the trunk so it groans;
Moving water, inevitable force,
Rotates the corpse into a bend,
Shoves it against the bank;
Some limbs splinter, some extend.

In summer it rests on wet sand exposed;
On the bank above, tall marsh grass grows
That bends and waves when the summer wind blows.

Needles fall, over years bugs crawl,
Bark disappears, decay advances
Until curved, white branches
Rise like dinosaur bones
From black water that flows slow,
While mayflies dance their dances
Silently like snow.