Preisha Writes

The grove died with a bright and thunderous uproar. Grey smoke choked the sky as orange silks danced beneath the bowing crowns of the mighty palm trees, leaving spiraling sparks to drift across the beach. Where there once was the healthy and light shiver of fronds, a hundred green fingers combing the sky, there was only a dark, charred, absence of them.

A lone palm remained, hunched and quiet. Quite a distance had stood between it and the grove, so only the outer side of its trunk had been blackened. The palm reached upward, its own crown thinned by the heat. A solitary shadow stretched over the scorched sands, reaching the remains of its kin.

Leaning towards where the neighboring palms used to be, the lonely palm met only an empty breeze.