The Shaping
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The Shaping
It was a windy evening in Swarnim Park. Fallen leaves lay scattered across the dirt path, the driest ones scraping along the ground as if refusing to go unnoticed.
As dusk settled, the birds returned — though not to the centrepieces. Those trees stood too trimmed, too symmetrical, too finished for anything to nest in. The yellow lights around them flickered on, drawing the eyes of every passerby, holding them there, making them trace every curve the gardener had made. They were perfect. Perhaps too perfect for their kind.
In the middle of all this stood a sapling. Branches reaching in uneven directions, untouched by any blade.
"Untidy," someone muttered, walking past.
The sapling didn't like that. But in two days it would be shaped for the first time, and that thought settled something in its chest.
Night deepened. The yellow lights dimmed to almost nothing. A half-lit moon took over.
"They loved you so much," the sapling said to the old tree, its words carried softly on the wind.
The old tree said nothing. Maybe it was waiting for a stronger gust. The sapling, never very patient, tried again.
"Do you think they'll shape me like you?" A pause. "They admired your shape so much."
A long silence passed between them.
"Indeed," the old tree finally said. "Admiration is a pleasant thing." Another pause. "Though it is a strange trade."
The sapling didn't quite follow. "Someone can definitely rustle," it replied cheekily.
A faint creak passed through the old branches above.
For a while, both stood listening to the dry leaves scraping softly across the dirt path.
Then the old tree spoke again.
"Do you see those trees near the boundary wall?"
The sapling looked toward the darker corners of the garden. Crooked branches stretched unevenly beneath the weak moonlight. Birds moved quietly between them.
"They look messy," the sapling said honestly.
"They do."
Silence settled again.
"But every season," the old tree said softly, "the birds return to them."
The sapling glanced back at the centrepiece trees glowing beneath their dim yellow lights.
"They never come here."
"No," the old tree replied. "Not anymore."
The sapling was quiet for a moment.
"But people love this part of the garden more. They love you."
"They do."
"So is it a bad thing?"
The old tree's branches shifted gently in the cold wind.
"No," it answered. "It isn't."
The sapling went quiet for the first time that night.
Far away, the sound of birds settling into crooked branches echoed faintly through the dark.
After a long while, the old tree spoke once more.
"It is only difficult sometimes," it said, "to remember which parts of you grew naturally — and which were taught to grow that way."
The sapling did not fully understand the words.
But for reasons it could not explain, the garden no longer felt as warm as it had earlier that evening.
The night passed as quietly as it had begun. The sapling lingered on what the old tree had said.
Morning came with the sound of clicking blades. The gardener worked carefully, almost lovingly. A cut here. Another there. The sapling stood through it all, proud. This was what it had wanted.
By evening, it looked beautiful.
Balanced. Clean. Understandable. Aesthetically pleasing.
People slowed on their walks home to admire it.
And somewhere beneath all that careful shaping, the sapling felt something it did not yet have words for. The old tree's words were still there, somewhere deep, beneath the new edges.
But the old tree said nothing.
Trees, after all, are not given the privilege of choosing what they become.
Note: I have used claude for rephrasing some words that I don't know and also for the grammar correction. The core idea of aesthetics and identity and how they both interact with each other is mine.
If you have read throughout this , I thank you with my heart out.