You pluck us off our green homes
And arrest us in your dark tresses -
To enhance your beauty and fragrance.
Won’t you redress please our little grievance?
Water our abodes just twice a week at least
After you have thrice a day your own feast.

You grow us vast for our blossoms and blooms
Roots and fruits, cork and bark, latices and plumes.
You squeeze us, you scorch us; you grind us, you grate us
You mince us, you mash us; you burn us, you boil us -
For your recipes and perfumes herbal.
Don’t we live and die for you without a grumble?
Won’t you then grant a request so humble?
Don’t cripple us with chemicals and pesticides
Lest our health be endangered, yours besides.

They pull us out and offer at your divine feet -
Devotees’ tenderness hasn’t yet turned effete.
Won’t you with a benign boon bless us the petite?
That our tribe cum fauna is not hewn down by gangs
Just for the greed of the human asphalt fangs.

[Apr 08,2009: : Hyderabad - 500 056]

AtreyaSarma Uppaluri

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/eco-echo/