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Writer's pictureTim Huber

A Well Rooted Tree

Leaves quiver,

branches shake,

and many young trees the wind doth take.

One tree,

newly sown and just beginning to grow,

is battered, bent, and tossed to and fro.

As the sun returns its shine

and the forest returns to life,

the young tree lays low from a thunderstruck blow.

It looks up toward the sky

at a tree of great height

and ponders such strength to survive such a night.

“Pray what is thy secret, oh tree in the wood?

How have you stood, when nothing else could?

How is it that I, being sturdy and young,

should fall before thou, for my life’s just begun!”

The tall tee casts its leaves

in a showering sneeze,

and answered the young tree with words such as these:

“Tis no secret I hide,

the answer I give free:

have patience and find

that my strength lives in thee.”

“But I have no such strength,”

the youth answers with angst.

“Do you not see my bent trunk

nor observe how I’ve sunk?”

You are blind, old tree!”

the youth answers angrily.

“Are you not wood and covered in bark?

And bear you not leaf, twined as if art?”

“These I have,” the youth replies.

“Yet I’ve fallen down low, and injured my pride.”

The aged tree creaks and shakes:

a memory sparked of his growth and uptake.

“Your roots,” he replied with a voice full of know.

“Too shallow are they, in time they will grow.”

“My roots it cannot be,” the youth quickly denies.

“My trunk is not thick, and no branches have I.

Once these I possess, I shall by your side,

and with great strength of limb, hold up the sky!”

“Not so,” the aged sighed.

“For many have died

with great trunks and long branches and plenty beside.

Tis roots that you need,

same as all of the trees

that fill fine forests, canopied such as these.”

“And what of age?” the youth asked.

“Does not time decay and take the young last?”

“In seasons of sun

what you say is what comes.”

“Why then has the storm

not bent your straight form

though you’re old and time’s toll should have rendered you worn?

“Tis time, you see, that brings strength such that these

long branches can bear without threat of a tear.”

“And what if I die

before time can provide

the strength I require the harsh winds to survive?”

“A travesty,” replied the old tree.

“Yet count thyself spared

from the dangers and snares

that time has dealt me, and now thicken my air.

Now take and repair

the damage you bear,

for strength will sooner grow if you learn from this scare.”

“To sit and to wait

is to surrender my fate,”

the youth said in confident haste.

“No roots will I grow

instead I shall show

that true strength is stemmed from how far my limbs go!”

The old tree sighed

and just about cried.

For he’d once been young

and many things done

that the youth at this point had only just begun.

“Your fate is your own

though I wish you would grow

to be healthy and strong, that many days you would know.

Carry on as you must

if you will not yet trust

the words of a tree who has gathered much dust.”

So the young tree grew

and spawned branches new

each long, sturdy, and true;

yet he had not grown roots.

Sun fled, and storm came.

Birds hushed, and fell rain

signaled the arrival of the four winds of pain.

The youth stretched his broad branches

To defy the advances

Of the howling storm and its lightning flash dances.

Yet try as he could

he no longer stood

when the storm had cleared and left the calm wood.

His shallow roots were upturned,

for his heavy branches had earned

his place in the dirt where he was cut and then burned.

Yet the old tree stood tall

although he knew he would fall

when time chose to take him, same as it does all.



 

This is a piece of the collection titled "A Walk in the Woods", to see others included simply click: #awalkinthewoods

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