Fruit and Life

It started a little less than a year ago. I opened myself to the wonders of my own heart. I watched it bloom and fruit. Then I watched the fruit fall to the ground. Some how I forgot growth is a process. I stood over the fallen fruit to protect it from the beating heat of the sun. I watched it, as it let go of it's skin, and change slowly into seed. I cried a lot that night. I cried because I longed to taste the fruit. I wanted to peel back the skin with my teeth and allow my tongue to lick the juices. I wanted to feel life flow through me from it's sweetness. I left it to die. I thought if it could yield more fruit, I could savor it in another season, another harvest. So, there I stood night after night, over this seed.

 One morning, I went out to stand over my seed, but it was gone. I heard a bird cawing over my shoulder. I turned to see my seed in it's beak. I cried for terror and shock. Why hadn't I buried it? It was too late. The bird flew away leaving behind nothing to show that I loved that seed. I was ready, but not ready enough. I didn't plant it in the deep darkness. I didn't let it rest and split. Instead, I listened and watch the grass grow around it. I watched the rain touch it, but it never broke. Now, I wish I were that seed. I wish I were the one taken in the beak of the bird. Who knows where it placed the seed. It doesn't matter, because I am not that seed. I am not free. I am only the picture of something promised to the moon and stars. I am only someone with a dream of being carried away to the unknown and left there to nourish the world.

 Til then I lean on the fruit bearing tree.