Why have you stayed when time has sapped my youth
And bent my branches like an aging oak?
Your sunshine smile metes life and still does soothe
Dread winters’ cold, much like a warm chinook;
Relentless time has weather worn my bark,
And on that crown, my faded leaves hang shorn;
I stand a craven relic, visage stark,
Whose rack has braved the might of every storm.
What shelter now do crooked limbs provide
Here barren, grey and stiff, bereft of cheer?
What providence do fruitless hands betide
When heavens’ thunder stroke looms ever near?
Yet you rewake new life like breaths of spring;
Each time you smile, loves’ sap fair flows again.

© Loubert S Suddaby. All Rights Reserved.