The Voice of One Calling

When I started upon this path, 

I was not so much called 

Than I was viciously retrieved with an unyielding arm

Rudely escorted off the premises of what used to be my life. 

I was confronted by a most fearsome devil one August afternoon 

Change. 

And so I began to unravel all I'd known 

Tossed the possessions I'd picked up in my travels 

In a little bag 

And started for North. 

I'd always been aware in myself an unrelenting oddity

I am all jagged edges and misshapen sinew

Not far removed from insanity itself

A perverseness that grew, feeding on itself like a well

And the startling fear that it had scarcely  begun

Here, in the clearing was more to come. 

I was sycamore hunched over 

Trying to keep myself small

But I was always meant to be a tree...

it is my nature to fall, haphazardly

spilling my leaves

Take up space, to defy, to break things, 

to reach both high and deep

To exceed what's expected of me

To dance in the breeze

Yielding summer fruit 

To be a dark thicket

Gnarled at the roots, tangled in the vines

Prickly to the touch, bark rough against fingertips 

And to burn, be chipped away 

Chopped up and hurt

To provide shelter for little birds

To rise out of the fire

A wild thing that refuses to die

To fight without saying a word

To be a part of history

Long after I am gone