We, the leaf-breath chorus, keep the long watch,
olive and bramble, root-knotted and remembering.
Under the moon’s cup of slow milk we listen;
our ribs of wood creak like old prayers, our veins sing sap laments.
He comes: a shadow that smells of blood and bread;
we drink His quiet with the thirst of green mouths.

Our leaves tremble as if each were a small hand,
fingering the dark, taking the salt of His sweat,
catching the confession that falls red rain.
We know the press of grief; our rings keep the years of weeping;
we had been there when laughter lodged in sunlight, when feet stamped summer;
now the night presses close, and our branches bow as if in benediction.

Thorns whisper what our bodies cannot shout: hold Him, hold Him;
but we hold only shade, and the soft give of earth underfoot.
Our roots groan with the weight of all that will be lost and sown;
we feel the trembling step as a storm moves through us.
He kneels; the soil remembers Him, and keeps His name like seed.
We are green seers; silent, patient, witness to human un/doing.