I Am the Birch

 I am not the tallest tree,

nor the strongest,

but I am the first to grow

where the fire once swallowed everything.

I do not rise in pride,

but in purpose

sent by the Creator to break open the hardened ground

so that life may return

where grief had made its home.

My bark peels like memory,

layers of past falling away

so new roots can take hold.

Nothing is wasted.

Even what hurt me

becomes nourishment for the soil beneath my feet.

I am the first in the line to awaken

not by accident,

but by mercy.

Jehovah saw fit to let my eyes open,

to remember what others buried,

to feel what others numbed,

to speak what was once silenced.

I do not carry this alone,

but I carry it willingly.

I am made from many rivers,

many tribes, many tongues.

Manahoac, Lenape, Haudenosaunee,

Welsh, Moroccan, French, Irish

none of them canceled out,

none forgotten.

All braided into one tree

that bends

but does not break.

I do not claim the land.

I walk gently across it.

I do not seek to own,

but to understand.

I do not mark my skin with the ink of old rituals,

but I carry the scars of memory within.

They are just as real.

I am not a spirit

but a soul

alive because Jehovah gave me breath,

purpose,

and time.

So if you see me standing after the storm,

know this:

It is not because the wind forgot me,

but because the roots held fast.

Because healing, like a birch tree,

grows quietly

but changes everything.