Does God so love the world

That He would fling face down

On the grass and cling to roots

On His last night on earth?

Oh, I have been God - God, here

Moved earth and rock,

Caused vine, tree, flower, to leaf and bloom,

Wrenched into being Beauty out of thought,

And loved the labor of it.

Grubbing ten fingers in the good brown soil

Around a rose's root, the

Heaving up heavy stones to build a wall,

The rocky stair, the pool with water in it,

I found peace.

A forgetting in the hot sun.

Peace in the sunny silent air.

And had the god's gift.

Familiar wonder at the patient miracle of seed.

seed, disregarding heartbreak,

Weary brains, a noisy world,

That delicately swells and bursts into a flower.

Attended little miracles of color,

Learned to shear their death away.

Godhead has passed.

Long live the world.

Long live the garden -

Though the world is ended.