Acacia Of My Blood Poem by Gert Strydom

When I let my eyes go over the earth
in the distance there’s a pretty green tree,
that stands out.

On the edge of Africa
her branches reach to the sky
and she almost touches the clouds.

I see that God could make no other
so wonderful and exceptional
and that as a sprout,
He protected her against overwhelming darkness.

Later a super power’s dread knights had drawn
their strongest weapons against her
and fire touched her bark,
but her thorns made them wrench
and drew painful blood.

She was trodden down and axed to pieces,
but with time her stem sprouted out again
and new shoots shot out
and grew stronger than before.

Out of the North
the enemy tried to put their hand to her again,
but where they stroke
her own gum brought healing
and they were torn apart
by huge branches with thousands of white thorns.

From near there’s great white thorns
that almost throngs each other out
and branches that braid against each other,
as if no one can grow together
and each has a live of its own.

Still they stream from all over the continent
to eat her berries and catch shade in her shadow
and her seedlings are sprouting out all over the world.

Acacia of my blood,
I will always be proud of you
and are called by God to be one of your offspring.