Life’s Garden Poem by Michael P. Johnson

A shallow soil receives no root
Nor superficial ground
From thus a tree can bear no fruit
And no rewards are found

Address the land address the seed
Plough deep the fallowed soil
Remove the rocks the clustered weed
Obstructing fervent toil

Afford no time to shifting sand
Where wisdom fears to sow
Evoke God’s blessings to your land
That seed to plants may grow

Root out the ground still hard and bear
Let hands and toil invest
That life’s sweet flow the crop may share
When time is at its best

Lest depths become too hard and dry
Lest wind remove the soil
Give care life’s water trickles by
Ere roots begin to spoil

Allow for fork and trusted spade
To shift the depths at will
For only then is progress made
And roots receive their fill

When seeds then die and roots emerge
When God sends morning dew
A downward thrush an upward surge
And life comes bursting through

As nature, so in spirit’s too
One rule combines the twain
Nature and Heaven stand God true
And life begins again