Trees on Retreat

Yesterday I finished eight days of silent directed retreat.  In a sense it was very much needed, and yet I realize how very fortunate and privileged I am to be able to take this time.  I am grateful. 

This was the first time that I made retreat in the middle of winter, and I did so in New England.  To think early last month I was in a place where if the temperature dropped below 70 degrees Fahrenheit, it was considered cold.  On retreat this past week, when occasionally the temperature reached just above freezing I was thankful for the warm weather.   How quickly perspectives can dramatically shift with a change in environment! 

Trees caught my attention, especially the deciduous trees, which seemed so dead though, in reality, they are just dormant.  Such a contrast to the Mango and coconut trees I left behind in Haiti!  It somehow seemed to make sense that I was on retreat in winter, for I needed a moment of stillness, to be dormant like the trees and allow the Spirit to work silently in me. 

In some ways, though I realized that parts of myself that had been dormant began to awaken during retreat.  During my time in Grand Goave, I had not written poetry and took pictures only rarely. Writing even simple blog entries had become a chore so much so that when I returned I did not intend to continue writing regularly. During retreat, poems started writing themselves in my head as I walked along nature trails at a nearby park. A part of myself came back to life bringing with it the courage and hope necessary to begin again. 

For the second time, since I wrote what I thought might be my final Haiti blog entry, I  am writing again because I feel inspired to do so.  I want to share with you, anyone who is actually interested enough to read this, a poem and a photo of the image that inspired it. 


   

In a seeming mid-life moment, 

so unexpectedly the tall tree was chopped down, 

fallen, 

feeling and fearing failure.    

But, hope hides in the hollow of dead decaying stumps, 

and grief and growth go together, 

Wisdom winks and whispers 

of perpetual paschal patterns. 

What was will nourish all that will be. 

There upon the dead decaying stump, 

a new tree of another species grows, 

the roots of the two intertwine underneath

the former's fading, feeding the flourishing sapling.  

Peace and blessings to you!