I sit on a bench in a warm-lit place,
    this familiar garden which oft feels still
though today the sounds of some avian race
    are thicker, more golden, the air more full
and I’m overcome by their temporal evidence:
    Their relentless existence that means a beginning.
        Every tune and rustle that ends began.
Time is a providence,
    to grant glorious movements, seasons and innings
        and through every age, to give more to man.

In time I bow, beneath the sky
    its horizon a halo around my view
not seen but felt, as some watching face
    a light of gold, or every hue.
It shines over grass and on my skin –
    material touched by the immaterial
        and more than touching, it bonds, sustains
like no created thing;
    an untouchable source, powerfully imperial,
        a dimension beyond design. My mind strains…

My eyes are drawn to where I cannot see
    beyond the medieval and the ancient
to stretch past men and a landless sea
    before the beginnings of sapiens sentient
and as all light unbirths I behold
    a being, ethereal, no universe around
        no time upon which such skates.
Yet the Spirit is old
    and of it a silent peace abounds.
        Such I see, then my soul shakes.

All is bright. From the peace emanates
    a whisper – unbearably strong due
to the nothing which otherwise permeates.
    Obedience occurs, from it and through,
measures become and planets condense.
    Always I’ll remember that first formation:
        the genesis of time, the labour of deity
which prompts: From whence
    came such a God, who before creation
        am who he am: Spirit of Aseity?

A shower of seed fell to the earth
to a chorus of “Wonderful”, loud, with mirth.
The earth was hungry, and thirsty in parts
and the seed did sprout in loamy hearts.
In those, the soil and seed clung together
safe from erosion in windy weather,
that through the wettest thunderstorm
the soil could drink and shoots be borne.

The soil was stunned by a screeching sound:
a shrike flew down on nearby ground
for on a path some seed was scattered
and to that black bird, just one thing mattered;
in a blink, one wouldn’t have known
that any seed had there been sown.

Seeing this, the good soil gasped,
and tightened on its seed its grasp.
Some nearby pebbles rolled away,
crushing their sprouts, and waving to say
“Goodbye, dear soil! It’s just not worth
the risks that weigh on planted earth.”

Then a thorny vine came down to reach
and brush the soil. It began to preach,
and weave its wayward worries: “Heed
my wisdom, friend, forget the seed,
forget the stones, for there is much
that you should tend to – chores, and such.
These are the ways we all grow rich –
not playing with seeds in a muddy ditch.”

The soil replied, “You thorny weed,
you won’t convince me to leave this seed.
Have you not read of Martha’s woe?
You’ll find my answer to you is no.
And as for the stones, I’m sad they fled
the crop and the bird with the serpent head.
One thing is needed to bear real fruit
and that’s to let this seed take root.“