Beneath The Shadowed Tree Poem by James McLain

Beneath the shadowed tree I lay,
Where whispers haunt the winds of day.
A secret born in silent years,
Its roots entwined with untold fears.

The sky grew heavy, dark with grief,
Each branch a tokened, fragile leaf.
My mother's tears, a shrouded stream,
Flowed through the fabric of her dream.

A father's sin, a child's despair,
The weight of truths too hard to bear.
Yet still the morning's golden hue
Gave light to shadows breaking through.

What voice has silence left untold,
What scars have whispered hearts consoled?
My breath was marked by anguished ties,
A fractured world behind my eyes.

I sought the strands that wove my fate,
To learn the tale, to bear its weight.
No fear could cage my will to see
The truths entwined with ancestry.

And though the nights were steeped in pain,
Each dawn would call my name again.
For in the mirror's quiet gaze,
I saw the light of healing rays.

Beneath the shadowed tree I grew,
Its branches reached toward skies anew.
Though roots may hold the earth's dark song,
The heart can rise, resilient, strong.

The winds will carry, soft and free,
The strength I claimed beneath that tree.