A tune of two trees
Have you planted a tree lately? Watered, hugged or climbed one?
Today, April 25 is Arbor Day, when we celebrate trees, green growing things and the promise of new life, new beginnings, renewal and hope. Is there anything more hopeful than planting a seed in the ground and caring for it, knowing that one day it will become a tree? Notably, Earth Day and the birthday of Kenya’s beloved environmental activist, the late Professor Wangari Maathai – Nobel Peace Prize laureate and founder of the Green Belt Movement – are all in April.
Get inspired by Prof Maathai’s amazing legacy and support her environmental work.
The Tree Song
While writing this, a memory came to me from decades ago: I was a teacher in Thika, Kenya, walking to my classroom when I heard students singing in the music room. It was a beautiful song about a tree. Standing outside with jacaranda and Thika flame trees around me, I stopped to listen to the end of the song, almost getting late to my next class. The tune became my ear worm for the rest of that week.
When this song returned to me earlier today, the only fragment I could remember was the last line: “I’m becoming what the Lord of Trees has meant me to be, a strong young tree”. Luckily, this is 2025 and Google could make out the distorted tune and jumbled words I hummed into my phone and was able to identify the song for me – The Tree Song.
It’s the story of two trees – a riverside tree and a city tree. The trees sing of how they got to be so big and strong, and the critters that hang out in their shade and branches. Decades later, this song moves me to tears. Perhaps because life matters so much more to me now, in this phase of my life. And because I’m acutely aware of the fragility of nature due to climate change. Also, last month I visited Karura Forest, one of the forests that Wangari Maathai fought so courageously to protect, where the threat of deforestation has been in the news lately. Learn more about this lovely forest and become a Friend of Karura Forest.
Today I’ll take a moment to sit with my favorite tree in my back yard, a white oak (Quercus alba), listen to the tree song and read this beautiful poem by Nikita Gill:
You Have Become a Forest
One day when you wake up, you will find that you have become a forest
You have grown roots and found strength in them that no one thought you had
You have become stronger and more beautiful, full of life giving qualities
You have learned to take all the negativity around you and turn it into oxygen for easy breathing
A host of wild creatures live inside you and you call them stories
A variety of beautiful birds rest inside your mind and you call them memories
You have become an incredible self sustaining thing of epic proportions
And you should be so proud of yourself, of how far you have come from the seeds of who you used to be.
Mango trees in Sagana, Kenya