A Tree Grows in Brooklyn: We Planted A Tree by Diane Muldrow

WE PLANTED A TREE,

AND THE TREE GREW UP.

A simple event--the planting of a tree, with a view to its future--is celebrated here. It is a common, albeit totally human event, but, as we know, so much depends upon the simple presence of trees.

Two young families, one in Brooklyn, another in Kenya, choose a spot and plant a tree, and those two trees, one in the tiny backyard of a brick rowhouse in the shadow of the Brooklyn Bridge, one near a small, low house on a vast, arid plain, take strong roots in their home soil as they grow up with the two families.

The trees bud and blossom and leaf out through the seasons, growing tall, and broad, holding the soil, providing shade for family picnics, a quick, cooling rest in the heat of the day, a branch for the children's swing, and a home for varied animals and insects. Season after season passes, and then one day the children of both families, now grown and with their own children around them, celebrate with their parents under the sheltering tree that has given so much to their lives.

Diane Muldrow's simple little paean to the wonder of trees, We Planted a Tree (Random House/Golden Books, 2010) nevertheless speaks eloquently to a world which needs all the trees it can get. Her gentle, easy-to-understand text describes how trees can make all the difference.

THE TREE KEPT THE SOIL FROM BLOWING AWAY--NOW RAIN WATER COULD STAY IN THE EARTH.

THE TREE'S LEAVES HELP CLEAN THE AIR. AND WE BREATHE BETTER.

WE PLANTED A TREE, AND THAT ONE TREE HELPED HEAL THE EARTH.

Pair this brand-new book with Donna Jo Napoli's excellent Mama Miti: Wangari Maathai and the Trees of Kenya, Gail Gibbon's notable The Seasons of Arnold's Apple Tree or Lauren Thompson's lyric The Apple Pie That Papa Baked, and Shel Silverstein's classic The Giving Tree 40th Anniversary Edition Book with CD a salute to tree, nature's queen of going green.

Oh, and if you can, plant a tree with a child.