7/31/22
The Changing of Seasons and the Forgiveness of Nature
The sun climbs its way up
Its light peeking its way over the mountain
The morning light hits the hazy skies
Smoke travels
Finding its way to our valley
Trapping itself
Creating an orange glow
The air smells of morning
The clearness of night quickly disappearing
Replaced by the heavy smell of heat
The sun warms the earth, threatening to scorch it
The sun rises higher
It's heat quickly overtaking
Breathing in you are suffocated
The heat threatening to take the air with it
The hot summer days
Long and unforgiving
Make me miss the softness of winter
Makes it hard to appreciate the importance
Of the few hot weeks we have a year
The heat dries out the earth
Stressing the plants
But killing the fungus that wreaked havoc across the land
A mysterious fungus
One no one knows the name of
But one that affects all
It killed the dogwood flowers
They shriveled up and turned brown
The leaves of the rose bush became weak
The fungus causing them to die
But surprisingly not affecting the rose flower
Whole canes of the boysenberry became baron
All their leaves and flowers dying
I remind myself to appreciate all
To appreciate the hot sun
Just as much as I appreciate the rain
Because both are just as important
Both are just as necessary
No matter how I feel about it
The earth doesn't bend to the wants of people
Meer humans wants are unimportant
She gives for the best for all
Kind to a fault
But if you harm her
Prepare for her wrath
You give to her
She'll give to you
Respect her
And she'll respect you
I ask for forgiveness
When I brush against the new growth of a tree and it breaks
I ask for forgiveness and I grieve
When I'm walking carelessly and take the life of an ant
I provide water for the animals when the earth has dried up
I provide shelter for them when the weather turns bitter
The slugs that threaten to destroy our crops
I move out of our garden
And into our food forest
Near the blueberries and elderberries
Where they can't cause any harm
Over there you find bugs of all kinds
Snails of all sizes live there
Rolly Pollies are plentiful
I grieve when I harm the worms while gardening
I ask for forgiveness when I know they won't survive
The spiders that make their way into our house
With care I catch them
Returning them to outside
Giving them a new home in our garden
I thank them for there service
When the cats bring in rats
Usually just babies
I catch them myself
And give them a peaceful death
I ask for forgiveness and grieve for them
The hate that many have towards the rat
I do not
But I know the danger of letting them live
Despite being innocent
They hold a risk to the health of my family and community
With this, I ask them for forgiveness
A racoon took the life of eight of our chickens
Those chickens provide food for us
But she took those lives to feed her young
In the end, we took her life
And buried her at the base of a young tree
We are no different than the racoon
I forgive her for the lives she took to feed her young
And I ask for forgiveness for the life we took from her
I thank the animal when I kill it
I thank the animal as I eat it
Its flesh becomes one with me
Feeding me and providing me with life
With the scorching sun of late summer
Autumn follows with winter not long after
The harsh lines of summer fade
Replaced with the soft lines of winter
The rain comes back
Just as the sun will once again
My death will come someday
Just like all things
When that times comes
I will be returned to the earth
And as my body decomposes
I'll feed the earth
Just as she fed me
YOU ARE READING
Thoughts Collected
PoesieA collection of poems written in my journal, and selected to be put here. The musings of a farmer and his life.
