Tuesday, July 19, 2011

Thistle

Jesus taught in parables, seemingly simple stories, with odd juxtapositions of images:  a good Samaritan, a woman sweeping her house to find a lost coin and spending more than the coin*s worth on a party, a mustard seed growing into a tree which will provide space for all the birds of the air... a mustard bush big as a house...some bush!  Jesus says to his disciples:    Do you understand?  They answer Yes.   Really?  Really?  Do they really understand?

Last summer a thistle grew
Next to the rhubarb.
In the near-demolished box
Of the vegetable bed,
A thistle took root.
I watered it.
Pretty soon I wondered
How big it would grow.
I remembered eventually
It would have purple flowers,
Then thistle seed for goldfinches.
It crowned at six feet
The thorns
The flowers
The seeds.
The goldfinches came
As I watched,
Swooped delighted in and out.

This Sunday Jesus asks us to consider
The mustard seed
The eventual mustard bush,
The birds that may visit
Even nest there
If we water it.

No comments:

Post a Comment