A Time For Prayer - A moving poem

Unseen
when the grass is faded to a hoary hue
and the trees are bereft of all
            but a few brown leaves
            too languid to fall
the sap begins to rise.

And at this
           the very inception of growth
we are bidden to pray
            to receive a fruit from the beautiful tree
            at the appointed time.

Prayer gives expression to faith
and a righteous man lives by his faith
and the Order of Seeds is "faith"
and the tree of the field is man

Man sows a seed and it rots;
he has faith and he waits.
Man buries his fellow, who rots;
he had faith and he waits.

When there is nothing left
when man is battered by failure and loneliness and death
when he has neither Torah, not mitzvos, nor understanding
he had G-d

He has the belief that the creation is for chessed,
and from that belief comes resurrection.

Habakkuk came and distilled all the precepts into one:
A righteous man lives by his faith.
An apt messenger this,
the child Elisha resurrected.

Thus, on the New Year for the Tree,
in the very dead of winter,
we summon our faith
            that hidden processes are at work
            that death is merely the waystation
                        to the ultimate chessed:

Perfection
Perfection within ourselves
Perfection with G-d
Perfection for all creation

And so we pray for a fruit
            from the perfected tree
to receive it at the appointed time

By: Rabbi Nesanel Kasnett, Editor at Artscroll Publications, Tu B'Shevat 5753

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