[Verse 1]
The hearing room is cold fluorescent light
A single oak tree drawn on the screen in white
Its drip line traced in testimony, inch by inch
My mother's basement suite hangs on the ruling's pinch

The arborist's report is the only love letter left
Its pages stained with sap and heartwood theft
I hold it like a prayer for the second egress door
And the chairperson asks what I'm appealing for

[Chorus]
Re: Drip Line Determination – Appeal Denied
Re: Oak Tree Protection Zone – Variance Applied
I plead the zoning by-law, I plead the family need
But the Official Plan's protection zone
Is a wall no building permit can exceed

[Verse 2]
Now the City's planner rises to the table
Reading Policy 3.1.16, voice perfectly stable
"The drip line is the area beneath the outermost branch
No encroachment, no excavation, no secondary suite trench"

She speaks in monotone like a final compliance order
Echoing 'round the hearing room, a living border
I see my mother's chair in the basement that won't be
And the oak tree's shadow spreads across the OLT

[Chorus]
Re: Drip Line Determination – Appeal Denied
Re: Oak Tree Protection Zone – Variance Applied
I plead the zoning by-law, I plead the family need
But the Official Plan's protection zone
Is a wall no building permit can exceed

[Bridge]
(Softly, the arborist's report is read as a benediction)
"Quercus rubra, age one hundred and ten years
DBH forty-two inches, the drip line is clear
No structure shall stand within the tree protection zone
This is the love letter… the only love I've known"

[Guitar Solo]
(A soaring, melodic lead guitar with thick delay, the drip line measured in every bent note, rising like a Notice of Appeal that will never be filed)

[Final Chorus]
Re: Drip Line Determination – Appeal Denied
Re: Oak Tree Protection Zone – Variance Applied
I plead the zoning by-law, I plead the family need
But the Ontario Land Tribunal's final word
Is a tree that will never be freed

[Outro]
(Spoken, reverb-soaked)
"This tribunal finds that the secondary suite is inconsistent with the Official Plan's tree protection policies. The appeal is dismissed. The oak tree's drip line shall remain inviolate."

(Gated snare, one final cascading piano chord, fade to silence)