Expected Death

Photo © Dawn Allynn


… And laying there, upon the ground,
with gaze fixed toward the waning day,
the acorn lay without a sound,
amidst the autumns disarray.

The green of life now all but gone
it’s edges yellowed, brown and dry,
the acorn sadly watched the oak
and waited for it’s time to die.

Wretched away from all it’d known,
from sap and leaf, from bark and limb,
the acorn fell upon the ground –
removed by Mother Nature’s whim.

“Oh grief, oh sadness!” The acorn cried,
“How awful is my deep despair!
How I crave to reach the sky,
To die down here seems so unfair.”

Bereft of hope, he missed his home.
His head he buried in the ground.
And letting go he waited for
Whatever’d come, without a sound.

Then, strange, a tugging in his soul.
He felt himself twist deep inside.
A change, a difference, a growing now …
An urge to do what he’d not tried.

Now skyward facing he took a breath,
And gave himself to what would be,
And felt his shell crack and give way,
The shoot inside now pushing free.

Toward Heaven stretching he heaved and worked,
Growing inches with his toil.
Finding strength with every breath,
growing inches with his toil.

As his limbs stretched to the stars
And mingled with both night and breeze,
He knew that it was letting go
That let him grow and be set free.