Being a Seed

I am a seed that swells with earth and water.
Though my shell is hard enough to break your
teeth on, time and melting snow accomplish what
exertion never could. I am a seed that would do
nothing but to heed my longing, ancient, deep,

beyond my understanding.

I am a seed that has no memory of being planted
in this fertile land. Safe and secure, I hug my
sturdy skin around me, grateful in my tiny
burrow when the winds with frigid fury wail an
inch, no more, above. Protected and content, I rest
until awakened by the thaw that never fails to
come in season. Buried, waiting, I can feel the
change in how the planet breathes, with each
unhurried exhalation warmer till the snow
recedes, the stony ground relents and softens.
Only then do I expend the energy I hoarded
through the winter... only when the elements
cooperate and not before. I neither labor nor
procrastinate, nor do I push against the soil... it
parts for me if I am patient, just as if it were the
Sea of Reeds and I were Moses bound for Canaan.

I am a seed and more... a dainty-leaved acacia,
lavish hyacinth, a lilac bush, a rose... What do I
care, now that I know the tender sweetness of the
sunwashed air at evening here beside an age-old
forest? I have seen the jeweled curtain of the night
sky and observed as one by one the stars winked
out like servants, dutiful and self-effacing in the
slow euphoria of dawn. For certain, the Almighty
is creating me as beautiful, as useful, and as
strong.