Strong and Enduring

Treaty Oak
Last survivor
Of fourteen majestic trees
Stands on Baylor St.
Between posh 5th St.
And infamous 6th St.
In Austin, Tx.

Five hundred years old
A sacred holy meeting place
A Council of Oaks
Between Comanches and
Tonkawas deciding
War and peace

Legends are told of how
Stephen F. Austin negotiated
Texas’s first boundary lines
With the local tribes
How Sam Houston rested
In its sprawling shade
At the start of the Civil War

Poisoned in 1989
By a man claiming
Unrequited love
Thinking a spell would
Bring back his beloved
Treaty Oak
Almost died
But children surged forth
With get well cards as the
world watched and waited

Treaty Oak survives
Stands on its small plot
Of land drinking in the
Sunshine while thriving
Austin grows around it