Lonely It Stands On the Hillside

Lonely it stands on the hillside, overlooking the bay.
The years untold have been kind as it has watched and waited.
Tall and strapping, it fears nothing, but that was not always the case.
Once it was short and weak, greener than the rawest recruit on the fields of death.
Of its brothers and sisters, none made it through that time, save itself.
Yet make it it did, and so lonely it stands on the hillside, overlooking the bay.

Tall wooden masts flow side to side as it watches, eternally on guard.
A sense of haste, man with fire, guns, war.
The valley changes, the bay grows filled with oars, yet still it stands.
Slowly its comrades fall, fueling an expansion they aren’t even a part of.
Yet somehow it survives; its perfect placement appealing to some quirk of aesthetics.
And all the while, tall wooden masts flow side to side as it watches, eternally on guard.

The years pass as it keeps its stoic watch.
The bay below transforms and transforms anew, each passing year bringing new motion.
Green and trees fight an ever losing battle with buildings and roads, reaching far as the eye can see.
Wood and stone turn to iron, iron turns to glass, and the city turns its eyes to the sky.
Striving ever higher, finally cresting even the great tree itself, far up the hill though it is.
And so the years pass, as it keeps its stoic watch.

Everything ends, in fire, screams, and death.
Mushrooms on the horizon, the people look up and run.
Walls of fire wipe across the earth, buildings crumble, damns break.
The metropolis below is wiped away as if in the blink of an eye.
Yet the tree endures. Tilted sideways from the blasts,
it watches as everything ends, in fire, screams, and death.

Lonely it stands on the hillside, overlooking the bay.
Time scours clean the rivers and the air.
Green slowly creeps down the valley walls,
obscuring the ruins of those foolish enough to think themselves masters of the universe.
Eventually no evidence remains, only green and brown, and scurrying of small feet returns to the valley,
as lonely it stands on the hillside, overlooking the bay.