-This poem reflects on the unseen rise of sap in early spring as a quiet force of renewal moving upward toward leaf, bloom, and transformation.
Inside the stillness of the tree,
a secret rising has begun,
not seen in bark, not heard in wood,
but carried upward all the same.
Through rooted dark and weathered trunk,
through every patient ring of years,
the hidden sweetness lifts itself,
toward branch and bud and waiting leaf.
No blossom shows this labor yet,
no green has crowned the furthest reach,
yet something climbs with quiet force,
and fills the bare with what will come.
So much of life begins this way,
in silence moving toward the light,
a tender strength no eye can catch,
until the world is changed by it.