And so the weary old man planted a seed,
beside the wall of God,
after many lost forgotten years,
a tree sprang forth from the earth,
seeing the tree the old man rejoiced,
singing praises to the Lord of creation
and after, the old man at his now great age
laid down by the tree, fell to sleep and died.

In the night of his death
the tree gave forth a light,
the light was so brilliant in its glow,
that it covered the land miles around.
When morning came people arrived to see,
the miracle of this illumined tree
but the tree had withered, fallen to the ground,
the people looked for the man and the tree
but none could tell one from the other,
for the tree and man had grown together
and they had died together,
the tree had grown within him
and together they became one,
now their purpose served and at an end,
all life from them had gone,
leaving only on the earth shadows in the sun.

Richard Allen Beevor

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-old-man-and-the-tree-2/