Growing Under an Apricot Tree

Punyasloka Mohapatra

The tree was already there
before I learned my name—
crooked trunk, bark split in places,
sap drying like old wounds.

My father said it needed discipline.
Every winter, he cut it back hard.
“Too many branches,” he’d mutter,
as if excess were a kind of sin.

I learned early
how to stand where the light thinned.

Apricots came small at first,
tight-fleshed, sour.
He’d bite into one, wince,
say nothing—
which was worse than saying it.

By then, I knew
what silence meant.

He showed me how to prune:
not where the branch wanted to grow,
but where it should have known better.

“Clean cuts,” he said.
“No hesitation.”

I tried to grow straight after that.
Kept my questions short.
Learned the weight of unsaid things,
how they hang heavier than fruit.

Still, every spring,
the tree went a little wild—
green pushing past the careful lines,
blossoms opening
without asking.

He’d stand there, looking up,
already measuring what to remove.

Once, I climbed it
when he wasn’t home.
Higher than I was allowed.
The branches thinned,
then held.

From up there
the yard looked small,
his rules—smaller.

I ate an apricot before it was ready.
It was sharp, almost bitter.
I didn’t spit it out.

When I came down,
there was sap on my palms,
sticky, refusing to wash off.

That evening, he noticed the broken twig.
Not me.

Now the tree is taller than the house.
He can’t reach the top anymore.

Some branches go where they want.
Some still bear the marks
of where he cut them back.

The fruit is better these days—
soft, almost too sweet.

I eat it standing under the shade
he tried to keep in check,
and for a moment
I don’t know

If I grew despite him,
or exactly the way he meant me to.