Poems (Jackson)/Transplanted
TRANSPLANTED.
HEN Christ, the Gardener, said, "These many yearsBehold how I have waited
For fruit upon this barren tree, which bears
But leaves With unabated
Patience I have nurtured it; have fed
Its roots with choicest juices;
The sweetest suns their tender warmth have shed
On it; still it refuses
Its blossom; all the balmiest summer rain
Has bathed it; unrepaying,
Still, its green and glittering leaves, in vain
And empty show arraying,
It flaunts, contented in its uselessness,
Ever my eye offending.
Uproot it! Set it in the wilderness!
There no more gentle tending
Shall it receive; but, pricked by nettle stings,
And bruised and hurt, and crowded
By stones, and weeds, and noxious growths of things
That kill, and chilled 'neath shrouded
And sunless skies, from whose black clouds no rain
Shall fall to soothe its anguish,
Bearing the utmost it can feel of pain,
Unsuccored, it shall languish!"
When next across the wilderness Christ came,
Seeking his Royal Garden,
A tree stood in his pathway, all aflame,
And bending with its burden
Of burnished gold. No fruit inside the wall
Had grown to such perfection!
It was the outcast tree! Deprived of all
Kind nurture and protection,
Thrust out among vile things of poisonous growth,
Condemned, disgraced, and banished,
Lonely and scorned, its energies put forth
Anew. All false show vanished;
Its roots struck downward with determined hold,
No more the surface roaming;
And from th' unfriendly soil, a thousand-fold
Of yield compelled.
The coming
Of the Gardener now in sweet humility
It waited, trusting, trembling;
Then Christ, the Gardener, smiled and said:
"O tree,
This day, in the assembling
Of mine, in Paradise, shalt thou be found.
Henceforth in me abiding,
More golden fruit shalt thou bring forth; and round
Thy root the living waters gliding
Shall give the greenness which can never fade.
While angels, with thy new name sealing
Thee, shall come, and gather in thy shade
Leaves for the nations' healing!"
Seeking his Royal Garden,
A tree stood in his pathway, all aflame,
And bending with its burden
Of burnished gold. No fruit inside the wall
Had grown to such perfection!
It was the outcast tree! Deprived of all
Kind nurture and protection,
Thrust out among vile things of poisonous growth,
Condemned, disgraced, and banished,
Lonely and scorned, its energies put forth
Anew. All false show vanished;
Its roots struck downward with determined hold,
No more the surface roaming;
And from th' unfriendly soil, a thousand-fold
Of yield compelled.
The coming
Of the Gardener now in sweet humility
It waited, trusting, trembling;
Then Christ, the Gardener, smiled and said:
"O tree,
This day, in the assembling
Of mine, in Paradise, shalt thou be found.
Henceforth in me abiding,
More golden fruit shalt thou bring forth; and round
Thy root the living waters gliding
Shall give the greenness which can never fade.
While angels, with thy new name sealing
Thee, shall come, and gather in thy shade
Leaves for the nations' healing!"