Bearing Witness
On days like this, it turns dark too early, heat leaching from brick by degrees as night sinks into bone.
This particular day, at the stub end of autumn, the forest stubbornly clings to yellow leaves and mud sucks at my shoes,
as I walk up from the woods, from wind and branch to sun and cloud
and turn left at the bridge toward home. I remember we planted trees once
in the black soil of our back yard, and we didn’t know what would happen next:
our gorgeous pact.
~
The promise of spring is that it comes to everyone. The seeds we throw into the world
will do what they must, reaching insistently into the sky, limbs outstretched,
forever hopeful, and the rising sun will shower them
with joy and heartache and oh, it will all be so beautiful,
and one of many reasons we are here together, after all is to bear witness.