My Trees are Old

 

My Trees are Old

(“And the seeds in the good ground are the ones who hear the word with an honest and good heart, hold on to it tightly, and produce fruit as they patiently endure.” Luke 8:15)

My trees are old, gnarled and unruly.
They toss their fruit like tennis balls on
the grass courts of Wimbledon. Cherries,
peaches, and plums. Their blossoms prepared
a pink and white carpet on the mini-forest floor.
Their life began a generation before
I stepped onto these three-quarters of an acre.
Now I own towering douglas firs
and more rhododendrons than is proper.
The roses hug the west wall and drink the sun
between raindrops. Red for passion, yellow for friendship;
they whisper that growth is slow and never inevitable.
They ache for my care lest their canes tangle. I put off
their winter pruning this year, so their arms and elbows
are thin as a grasshopper’s legs.
The wilderness begins at the end of my
back yard, a logging trail at the bottom of the hill. I have
not yet
grown weary of green.