The tree sat up, ‘Oh’ thought the tree, ‘that was weird’. The tree had stood in the twelve acre field for over a hundred years, only the tree really knew how long it had been there. Through storms and droughts, through coldness and heat, forever, proudly standing over the field, watching the field change from bare soil to a golden harvest. Watching birds, insects, animals and mammals grow up, have families of their own and move on, tree had seen it all. The tree who had sheltered everything from people to badgers and birds to insects from the rain and sun over the years stood up, ‘how weird’.

The tree looked down and saw a fallen tree in the twelve acre field he had known for so long. Every bush, post, deer, hedgehog and butterfly, tree knew but had never seen a fallen tree or any tree that looked like that there before.

The tree began to float upwards, carried on the wind and realised they were no longer a tree standing in the twelve acre field. The fallen tree was where they had stood for all this time. Blown over in a storm to stand no more, letting go of its roots and releasing the tree spirit from within.

The tree spirit swooped down and around the fallen tree, speeding through and around all its branches and examining the hole where the roots had been, where it had stood for so long in one spot, looking here, there and everywhere at the same time. The tree spirit glowed as it darted around the twelve acre field looking at every leaf and spider, every branch and fence post that was in the field.

Although the tree spirit could no longer protect the inhabitants of the field as a tree, they would watch over the field for ever and a day, watching new trees, shrubs, animals, mammals, insects and blades of grass grow, forever from above.

Thank you for reading this story and I do hope you enjoyed it. I enjoyed writing it and will continue to create as long as I wield a pen. To support me and my writing you can help boost my moral and buy me a much needed journal or a nice coffee, this would be very much appreciated to encourage me to keep on writing new stories.

Photo by Ryan Fyfe