Northern Spy Apple Tree -

Years ago I was young, BB gun in hand, that day in the front yard,
I learned instantly, that I can be the evil, because I thought nature was for me to discard.
The red robin flew in, and landed atop the Northern Spy Apple Tree,
So innocent and trusting, the red robin did not know, that the evil to fear was me.

I raised, and I aimed, and I pulled slowly the trigger,
She squaked, and she fluttered, and she fell down through the branches, with no forgiver.
That day, and that sky, was filled with gentle flakes of snowfall,
It was so white, and it was so silent, but my actions ruined it all.

The red robin lay fluttering, not dead, making bloody snow angels, in the virgin snow,
The snow's white blanket was soaked, in her red robin's blood, to this day in my mind, it is still all aglow.
I knew and learned at that moment instantly, to let live and respect, and to let all creatures be,
But I was not done, I still had to show mercy, I had to finish her off, to set the wounded red robin free.

So I lowered, and I aimed, and I pulled the trigger quickly, that one last time,
At the moment I also killed part of myself, it was life changing and troubling, I had to make sense of it over time.
To this day, I still think about that red robin, just trying to make a winter's living,
Pecking away at the rotten apples, unlike me that day in the winter, when I was taking, even the apple tree was a giving.

Now when spring brings the searching, trusting, red robin to sing and to stay, I always remember that fatefull murderous day,
I learned to have a spititual respect with nature that day, as I stood there looking down, and the dead red robin motionlessly lay,
Slowly the snow fell through the sky down on us both that day, along with my frozen in time tears,
Its always in my mind to stay, the snowfall never covered it over, even after all these years.

I want to pick a apple from that Northern Spy Apple Tree.
I want that red robin to peck a apple from that Northern Spy Apple Tree.
At the cost of that red robin that day, I have learned to respect nature, my mind and eyes were opened, and I began to see.
And that is how I was taught to respect nature, and that this world is not just all about me.

D. Matthew Beebe