God, help us to grow
like a garden
like a song
like a tree.
Like a great tree
like one of those great, old trees
you meet sometimes and hug
wandering lost
or enchanted
in a deep, dark forest
in an empty field.
A great, old tree
with roots that reach down to the heart
roots that reach down but
break through the ground around the trunk and lift
as if the earth can’t contain the yearning.
As if the earth shall erode and pass away and
all that shall be left in the end is Spirit.
~Neil Paytner
There are years when the emergence of green on trees seems to happen overnight. You can go to bed noticing only tiny buds and by the same time the next day the tree is in its summer fullness. This is not one of those years. I have been keeping an eye on the tips of branches for weeks now, watching for that moment when there is an artist’s brush of yellow-green etched on the skyline. It has been slow in coming. The artist seems to have taken a very long vacation.
Watching trees is important. Watching trees in this particular spring has become a Zen-like experience. Breathe. Open eyes. Breathe. Notice. Breathe. Wait. Breathe. Observe. Breathe. Smile. Breathe. Open heart. Breathe. Repeat.
In my practice of this mental tree hugging, I have noticed that all around the Twin Cities there are blooming magnolia trees. It seems a miracle to me that this flowering tree, one I associate with more sultry, warmer climates, can survive the Minnesota winters and now be showing forth their magnificent blossoms. Their white or pale pink,showy flowers seem foreign somehow, a transplant that is trying to fit in but is unable to reign in their southern showiness in this spartan, Scandinavian landscape. Their fluttery petals always remind me of Zelda Fitzgerald or other women of a fragile nature whose personalities are highlighted in stories of misplaced people, humans who find themselves living in a place that does not quite fit them, in a place they can never call home.
Last weekend I was at our church’s retreat center and sat for some time in the chapel which has windows that open all around into the wooded areas that surround it. Bare, gray and black branches held forth. Only the majestic Weeping Willow pushed any color into the world. Its drooping, teardrop branches offered a golden yellow into a scene that could have been a snapshot of November or March but not May.
This morning as I walked out into the world, I looked up and was greeted by the pale, yellow-green I have been waiting for. Breathe. Notice. Nearly all the trees seemed to have awakened in the cool temperatures that moved in last night. But the trees, in their innate wisdom, seemed to have made some choice. Enough is enough. Even those that have no showy magnolia blossoms to offer woke up to the May that is here.
Growth, for trees and for humans, comes in its own good time. Earth and skin, at some point, cannot contain the yearning. And so we breathe, open our eyes and hearts. We notice, observe, smile. And we repeat for all the seasons we are privileged to do so until all that is left will be Spirit.
