Jesus compared the kingdom of God to a man who scattered seed (Matt. 13:3-9). It is a marvelous parable showing that things of God are tossed out there with no guarantee that anything will take root. But the one who sows seed in the parable does it in hope that some things will spring up and grow.
While today’s poem, “Maple Seed”, wasn’t directly inspired by Jesus’s parable, I see similar notes of hope in it. One particular strain of hope in the poem that is meaningful to me is that even apparently wasted things might have effects we can’t see or understand. My prayer is that nothing in our lives is truly wasted but that somehow, everything serves a deeper purpose.
“Maple Seed” will be in my upcoming book, A Song of Glass. I am guessing this book will come out in late 2025 or in 2026.
Maple Seed
A maple seed,
its helicopter blades broken,
lies on the passenger floor of my car,
probably tracked in on someone’s shoe.
There is a whole tree in that seed.
How many trees
flutter to the grass,
blow into gutters,
or fall on trampled sidewalks?
And who can find the edges
of such prodigal dreaming
or of the dense wood it forests?
A Wandering Minstrel 