Living Tree Poetry

Following is not so hard.
It’s following the bird’s call back to its branch.
It’s following the crest of the wave back to where it breaks.
It’s following the sun’s eventual descent
and the stars charted tracks.

It’s walking forwards
and then often back.
In circles, or figure eights.
It’s taking a detour, for a visit or a view.
It’s forgetting and then retracing steps.

Following is not hard.
It’s following the rivers fall into the crevice.
The tree line to the ridge.
The change of vegetation
to each mountain’s peak.

It’s listening, and it’s seeing.
Tracing feelings, and following thoughts to their origins,
or to where they peter out and dissolve.
It’s feeling the stone’s edge, the smooth pebble,
or rough face of rock.

It’s holy listening, seeing, sensing.
A pilgrimage where our outward steps
reflect the labyrinth within the hearts
Where Nature’s breath slows our own,
causes us to pause and match the rhythms of grace.

Following is hearing, and recognising our yearning
as a call in the bush from one bird to another.
Registering the response to our heart’s pain,
and our souls cry to connect,
with one who hears our call and responds with his.

Following is finding our way,
where we thought we had become truly lost.
It’s discovering there is no place he is not.
That where the light dissolves,
we turn around and find it ascending.

The one we follow is always reappearing.
We follow his feet.

 
Ana Lisa de Jong
January 2018