Amazing

It is amazing.
Don’t you know that it’s amazing
to see a plant all wilted, hanging down and dry
— so dry it thirsts for death — —
so dry it cries in silence,
for its fiber has no strength
to whine,
to wail,
to do any thing but waste,
and it’s amazing, that is certain,
to see it after it has drunk
the welcomed, long-straw, resurrection water,
to see it slowly gather strength
and lift triumphant fronds to sky
as if to shout, “Hallelujah, I have won!”
But do its ills help it grow stronger,
or has it lost a piece of strength
that it will need tomorrow?
It’s amazing — don’t you see? —
to wonder all about it,
to understand the answers will not come
until, like the plant, we’ve thirsted
and must reach out to meet our future.