The Truth of Trees by Charissa Sylvia

The trees tell me
of the truth,
in their ancient, weathered way,
“look up, listen close”,
they sing softly 

as they sway,
“your bending is not your breaking,
your grieving will have an ending,
his sorrow will be your mending,
arm yourselves with beauty in the waiting.”

They whisper wild and wise,
arms lifted high,
stalwart witnesses,
sentries across the centuries,
to the battles we fight,
silently tending the wounds we bear,
the solace of their solitude,
its own poignant prayer.

Their arboreal chorus tells
of a promise kept,
by a divine King,

who himself 

wept in a grove
and knows 

the aching and breaking
of our frail bones,
tells how he undid 

death with death,

hung heavy on a tree,
to secure the promise
of the tree of life,
for us aching for 

the healing of its leaves.

Charissa Sylvia is a pastor's wife and homeschooling mama writing from Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. She writes on the ancient, mountain peaks surrounded by contemplative silence and profound mystery. Ok, just kidding. She writes in a small apartment looking at a busy road with rooms full of cats and kids and mysteriously spilled drinks as well as a hopeful eye towards the light and the firm belief that the ground right under her feet is holy.