There is a church in the clearing that looks like a tree

My Hometown Poem #77

Oct 07, 2022

Text within this block will maintain its original spacing when published

There is a church in the clearing that looks like a tree.
A cottonwood, towering over the dry creek bed
Centuries old, carved in half by lightning,
Keeping watch over the clover and corn.

There is a songbook on the sidewalk that looks like a leaf.
A maple, blazing red with a fiery rim 
Of orange and gold near its elegant edges, 
Delicate, fragile.
The page of a hymnal turning and blowing in the breeze.

There is a pew in the yard that looks like a rock.
A sprawling block of granite, pinkish gray with silver flecks of mica
Solid, inviting, an anchor.
Children sit on its flat sloping surface
waiting for the bus to stop.

When I do not have the strength to face
The sadness 
That wells up inside me, 
When the feeling that I am beaten
Or the fear that the world is broken rushes over me like a 
Whitecap of grief, 
I go to the clearing
And ask the sun and the tree and the rock for forgiveness 
For grace.

There is incense in the air that smells like the autumn night.
Fields turning, ochre and amber,
dry and crisp,
Flowers on their knees, taking their last breath
In a benediction towards the earth.