Your front page photo ('Grand Trunk Road', #247) could break anyone's heart. At a time when the environment of Kathmandu Valley is worsening the authorities should have been planting more trees instead of felling them. I am writing to you to seek some answers. While people are being cut down outside the capital, in Kathmandu we are witnessing terrorism against trees-the brave and innocent beings that had been protecting the Valley for ages. The sight of the corpses of these trees on your front page was heart-rending. Whoever is responsible for this deed with misplaced logic and values must be prosecuted.

Jaya Dev Baidya,
Thapathali

Before all our species leave the valley
Hauled away in heavy trucks, it's time
To praise improvement of the city
And confess to a past of crime:

Forgive our jaunty limbs and shiny leaves,
That cluttered views and clogged the sewer.
Who but foolish cows could grieve
The loss of shade and scent of verdure?

We kept aloft, with too much poise:
As cars and buses slammed our trunks
(Grinding gears with fumes and noise)
We only emanated love, like monks.

So hear, to our misdeeds give coverage!
We trees don't often strive for mention in the press
We have no love of paper used for printing knowledge
(In fact, we would prefer if printed news were less).

Now one can stroll the boulevards with ease,
Gone is fear of bumping into dirty trees.
We deserve our end and are not displeased
With afterlives as toothpicks for the Nepalese.
Eucalyptus, Jacaranda, Pine, Pulchok

Mister! I am the Lorax. I speak for the trees.
I speak for the trees, for the trees have no tongues.
Way back in the days when the grass was still green
and the pond was still wet
and the clouds were still clean,
one morning, I came to this glorious place.
And I first saw the trees!
But that was a long time ago, today
at the far end of town
where the Grickle-grass grows
and the wind smells slow-and-sour when it blows
and no birds ever sing excepting old crows...
is the Street of the Lifted Lorax.

After Dr Seuss,
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