POEM: A Ministry Without Answers

Some days I like to wander

Right after the sun has risen—or is about to set

When the light catches the oak canopies here in the canyon

Turning their boughs to treasure chests

This is a good place to ponder my destiny

Because the world here has no answers for my questions

Instead the tap of a woodpecker meters my steps

Gnats dance in a golden veil of dust

And a grazing deer turns to look at me

Frozen in utter attention

_

There is a ministry without answers, after all

And perhaps that is what we should seek

A kingdom of oak and elm and rogue eucalyptus

Of mockingbirds and swallows

Red ants and grasshoppers

All carrying on through the changing seasons

Bearing much, yes, but never one thing

Never this one thing:

The worries of tomorrow

POEM: The Tree(s) of Life

Have you ever walked past a grove of cypress

And felt the air cool?

Or swung from the branches of an aged oak?

Tasted the sweet lifeblood of a sugar maple?

Breathed in the festive aura of Douglas fir?

_

I am beginning to suspect 

That the Tree of Life will indeed heal the nations

Just like the ancient stories foretell 

Perhaps not a singular tree though, but many

The trees of life

That surround us every day.

_

They reach out and up with flush green canopies

Bulging trunks patient and rooted

And breathing, always breathing

Absorbing the cost of our greed and excess

Cleansing, refreshing, bearing our sins

Sheltering, bringing forth fruit in season

Holding in place the very earth beneath our feet

_

Yes, the Tree of Life is among us already

In seven and seventy-times-seven ways 

Breathing in our costly days on earth 

And exhaling life, always life

Cedar offering her durable timber

Apples, a great harvest come autumn

Willows weeping over the grief-stricken by the river

_

Give thanks, sing praise, for the trees of life

Whose healing leaves surround us 

Now and forever

Amen