Bonsai is art my parents like
They cut here, there, left, right,
Trimming off the unkempt leaves
Cutting off the branches clean
Off of their precious banyan tree
To achieve the perfect shape
Sketched in a dog-eared page
In the book their forefathers gave.
Showing off is a must, it seems.
“What pretty leaves!” they squeal and scream.
It is no theft, but surely a steal
To have such a perfect banyan tree
With leaves and boughs so petite
Unbothered by pests and bees,
Oh, my parents always sigh in relief
Thank God theirs is dainty and neat!
Not like the beast scarring the scene
The wild and free banyan tree
With wasps and ants in its leaves
With ghosts and jinns lurking within
With the stink of **** at its feet
Grows the great banyan tree.
To stand beneath its shadowy canopy.
To stretch my hands to sky and infinity
Oh, to provide such shade and love
With roots so stable and firm.
This longing, this desire floods my trunk
Towards the banyan, I stretch my arms.
What I’d give to grow wild and untouched
Yet my branches and roots have shrunk
For the little banyan tree I have become.
May 17
May 17, 2026 at 4:54 AM UTC
Bonsai is art my parents like
They cut here, there, left, right,
Trimming off the unkempt leaves
Cutting off the branches clean
Off of their precious banyan tree
To achieve the perfect shape
Sketched in a dog-eared page
In the book their forefathers gave.
Showing off is a must, it seems.
“What pretty leaves!” they squeal and scream.
It is no theft, but surely a steal
To have such a perfect banyan tree
With leaves and boughs so petite
Unbothered by pests and bees,
Oh, my parents always sigh in relief
Thank God theirs is dainty and neat!
Not like the beast scarring the scene
The wild and free banyan tree
With wasps and ants in its leaves
With ghosts and jinns lurking within
With the stink of **** at its feet
Grows the great banyan tree.
To stand beneath its shadowy canopy.
To stretch my hands to sky and infinity
Oh, to provide such shade and love
With roots so stable and firm.
This longing, this desire floods my trunk
Towards the banyan, I stretch my arms.
What I’d give to grow wild and untouched
Yet my branches and roots have shrunk
For the little banyan tree I have become.
Growing up in a conservative family, my movement and identity were heavily restricted. Who I talked to, what I wore, how I thought were surveilled and curtailed to be within the confines what was "right" for a girl. Any branch curving along the "wrong" lines meant sawing it off, cutting it off cleanly. The banyan tree, wild and big and old and eery, was what I was meant to be yet my upbringing was bonsai, creating a small perfect tree my family could show off, dead as I was deep within.