I’ve sat in this park for over three hundred years,

yet one of them was loud then soft.

No more children dance on my branches,

no more couples carve my bark.

Though at first I was happy,

I miss them in my park.

My children crowd around me,

while I reconsider,

if they were truly around, why not cull them away

to have a village green again?

Twenty years and counting, since I’ve seen even one,

but I’ll stand a thousand years,

until they come again.