A Young Fool's Legacy

I think I may have puzzled out The tree Joyce Kilmer's poem's about. That it's an oak is in my head, But now she's old and nearly dead. Her roots are dry, Her branches bent, Her breast by cruel lightning rent. Her head, once proud, now bowed and bare, In spring no robins nesting there. She cannot lift her limbs to pray, He never answers anyway. But if only God can make a tree, Then there remains a mystery. How could a gardener such as He Take time to make, so lovingly, Then spurn and turn His back And callously forsake His artistry? Her beauty lives in poetry, Part of a young fool's legacy. Oh, would that I could make her whole, Or give her peace And help release her soul. Joyce Kilmer published his poem in 1913 when he was 27 years old. Five years later he was dead at age 32, killed by a sniper's bullet in France, toward the end of WWI. It seems God had no more concern for the poet than He had for the tree. Maybe He didn't like the competition from a mere mortal who could produce a piece of work so beautiful as to rival His own creation.