Imagine there is a city. Imagine it has no trees. And a city without trees means a city devoid of orchards, gardens and parks. A city devoid of orchards, gardens and parks means no habitat for birds. A city without birds will have a dead sky overhead; a monotonous blue made duller by poisonous emissions of innumerable man-made machines ever in action. A city without trees denies to itself the best i.e. what sprouts from the earth. Sprouts are a testament to the riches the earth holds in its entrails without which life of any kind is not only difficult but also not sustainable for long. If a city turns into a patch of dead earth, the sky above would be deader as it is intrinsically static occasionally accorded the semblance of being dynamic by racing clouds, frightening thunderbolts and piercing flights of flocks. In other words, a city made barren by concrete would have a joyless sky. Below and above or earth and sky are inextricably linked in a cosmic web. If this natural link is disrupted, the disaster of some kind is in the making not far away in the distant future.

The tree has been with human beings since time immemorial. Human beings emerged from the primordial black forests as has been shown by researches on the evolution of human society.

In the Vedic literature especially in Rig-Veda Samhita and some of the Upanishads we find the tree as metaphors signifying the near impenetrable world of metaphysics. A parable of two birds is narrated in some details. Interestingly the birds inhabit the Tree showing an inseparable connection between the two. The first bird eats the fruit while the second merely looks on. The first symbolises a Jiva, the individual self that succumbs to worldly desires and is perishable. The second reflects Paramatman, imperishable divinity as found in human beings in their earthly life. It simply demonstrates that trees and birds are inseparable. Trees, a form of life in themselves, sport another form of life.

The Bible talks of two trees planted in the Garden of Eden; the tree of life and tree of knowledge of good and evil. God ordained that Adam and Eve were free to eat the fruits from all the trees except for tree of good and evil. Satan disguised as a serpent persuaded Eve that fruit of the forbidden tree if eaten would make her and Adam immortal like God. When they ate the fruit they realised that they had sinned. And thus they lost the eternal bliss of Paradise. A paradise without trees is inconceivable.

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In our classical literature we find ubiquitous presence of tree as a symbol and metaphor. A few examples will be in order. ‘How long a tree can hold on the banks of a raging river…’, says Baba Farid, the founder of Punjab’s modern literary tradition. In another couplet, he warns those who aspire for the mystic way of life that ‘mystics need the patience and perseverance of trees’. In the legend of Heer, the ‘Baila’ [mangrove/jungle on the riverbank] is a space marked by freedom and romance that defies the social and economic hierarchy. It’s a safe haven for humans and animals. In another tale of Sahiban Mirza, the Jund tree comes to stand as a sign of life in the land laid waste by salinity. ‘I, a small Jund in the wilds, am a mark [of life] in the salinized soil’, says the tree while talking in a mythopoeic manner to the heroine of the tale as narrated by poet Hafiz Barkhurdar.