Gieve Patel’s poem ‘On Killing a Tree’ presents a vivid description of man’s cruelty and violence to nature to advocate the philosophy of non-violence. In the poem, the tree stands for nature that provides nourishment, for man. But modern man, out of selfish greed, kills a tree and thereby destroys nature. The poet describes the whole process of killing a tree. Neither a simple jab of the knife nor hacking and chopping can kill a tree. It is firmly fixed with its roots anchored in the earth. So, it has to be roped, tied and pulled out of the earth-cave to kill it completely. Then it has to be exposed to sunlight and air scorching, choking, browning, hardening, twisting and finally withering. The poet uses a number of images of death to highlight man’s cruelty and violence. Thus he tries to arouse our love and sympathy for all its objects of nature.