You know of forests rising
and sinking into themselves.
You know of breaking yourself open
and letting the secret miracle
flow from within.
Your creatures pass through
the valley of shadows,
caterpillars that entomb themselves,
decay, and turn to mush
before emerging, changed,
rain and rivers that become seas,
seeds and tadpoles that become
something other that what they were.
The tree that surrenders its fruit
so that there may be trees.
You know of life falling like leaves
into death, to become life.
On your back you carry us
wrapped in streams and currents
of self-giving that breathe in and out.
You hold us with a gravity
that is something like love.
You know our demands, our cruelty,
the marks of the nails in your hands,
and yet you forgive, and give,
and give, that we may live.
O Earth, Word of God made flesh,
teach us of resurrection.

__________________
Steve Garnaas-Holmes
Unfolding Light
www.unfoldinglight.net
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