The Sower
The winds had hushed at last as by command;
The quiet sky above,
With its grey clouds spread oer the fallow land,
Sat brooding like a dove.
There was no motion in the air, no sound
Within the tree-tops stirred,
Save when some last leaf, fluttering to the ground,
Dropped like a wounded bird.
Or when the swart rooks in a gathering crowd
With clamorous noises wheeled,
Hovering awhile, then swooped with wrangling loud
Down to the stubbly field.
For now the big-thewed horses, toiling slow
In straining couples yoked,
Patiently dragged the plowshare to and fro
Till their wet haunches smoked.
Till the stiff acre, broken into clods,
Bruised by the harrow's tooth,
Lay lightly shaken, with its humid sods
Ranged into furrows smooth.
There looming lone, from rise to set of sun,
Without or pause or speed,
Solemnly striding by the furrows dun,
The sower sows the seed.
The sower sows the seed, which mouldering,
Deep coffined in the earth,
Is buried now, but with the future spring
Will quicken into birth.
Oh, poles of birth and death! Controlling Powers
Of human toil and need!
On this fair earth all men are surely sowers,
Surely all life is seed!
All life is seed, dropped in Time's yawning furrow,
Which with slow sprout and shoot,
In the revolving world's unfathomed morrow,
Will blossom and bear fruit.
poem by Mathilde Blind
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God's-Acre
I like that ancient Saxon phrase, which calls
The burial-ground God's-Acre! It is just;
It consecrates each grave within its walls,
And breathes a benison o'er the sleeping dust.
God's-Acre! Yes, that blessed name imparts
Comfort to those, who in the grave have sown
The seed that they had garnered in their hearts,
Their bread of life, alas! no more their own.
Into its furrows shall we all be cast,
In the sure faith, that we shall rise again
At the great harvest, when the archangel's blast
Shall winnow, like a fan, the chaff and grain.
Then shall the good stand in immortal bloom,
In the fair gardens of that second birth;
And each bright blossom mingle its perfume
With that of flowers, which never bloomed on earth.
With thy rude ploughahare, Death, turn up the sod,
And spread the furrow for the seed we sow;
This is the field and Acre of our God,
This is the place where human harvests grow!
poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
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Olney Hymn 16: The Sower
Ye sons of earth prepare the plough,
Break up your fallow ground;
The sower is gone forth to sow,
And scatter blessings round.
The seed that finds a stony soil
Shoots forth a hasty blade;
But ill repays the sower's toil,
Soon wither'd, scorch'd, and dead.
The thorny ground is sure to balk
All hopes of harvest there;
We find a tall and sickly stalk,
But not the fruitful ear.
The beaten path and highway side,
Receive the trust in vain;
The watchful birds the spoil divide,
And pick up all the grain.
But where the Lord of grace and power
Has bless'd the happy field,
How plenteous is the golden store
The deep-wrought furrows yield!
Father of mercies, we have need
Of thy preparing grace;
Let the same Hand that give me seed
Provide a fruitful place!
poem by William Cowper
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The Sower
(Matthew, xiii.3)
Ye sons of earth prepare the plough,
Break up your fallow ground;
The sower is gone forth to sow,
And scatter blessings round.
The seed that finds a stony soil
Shoots forth a hasty blade;
But ill repays the sower's toil,
Soon wither'd, scorch'd, and dead.
The thorny ground is sure to balk
All hopes of harvest there;
We find a tall and sickly stalk,
But not the fruitful ear.
The beaten path and highway side,
Receive the trust in vain;
The watchful birds the spoil divide,
And pick up all the grain.
But where the Lord of grace and power
Has bless'd the happy field,
How plenteous is the golden store
The deep-wrought furrows yield!
Father of mercies, we have need
Of thy preparing grace;
Let the same Hand that give me seed
Provide a fruitful place!
poem by William Cowper
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A Dead Leaf
between these two shores
i float like a dead leaf
am not dead either..
if i was i will not feel the pain
budded flowered and became a fruit
on one shore
eaten and as a bare stray seed laid
at the other shore
as a seed i did germinate
the mother root grew into a tree
an off spring flower and fruit came by
all along as a seed i thought i was the tree itself
I NEVER THOUGHT I WILL LOOSE
MY IDENTITY AS A SEED
CAN A TREE SHOW ITS SEED
EVEN IF IT WANTS TO
ALL ALONG...
I thought i was the tree itself
may be i was a part of each part
the stem to hold, the leaf to nourish
till fate wind blew me down as a dead leaf
today as a dead leaf i float
wanting a living from one shore
wanting relationship from the other
as a dead leaf i float..am not dead with pain
ALL ALONG....
I DID THINK I WAS THE TREE ITSELF
BEING JUST A SEED
poem by Samanyan Lakshminarayanan
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The Seed And The Tree
Who can say for sure as to what came first: the seed or the tree?
If the seed came first where did it come from if not from the tree?
But then if the tree came first where did it come from except from a seed!
So then you'll have to re-ask again that question of the origin of the seed.
An endless circle with no logical conclusion soon appears
until one looks beyond the seed and the tree that it bears.
Although the seed comes from the tree and the tree from the seed
each one grows in the ground of mother Earth which both does feed.
The Earth is the womb of everything living and supports all we know
and then becomes the tomb back into which all forms one day must go.
The underlying essence of all nature is of consciousness-energy-intelligence
that includes and sustains all things despite our ever incessant belligerence.
Has anyone ever heard it said that God is in the form of the world
and so all within it carries a divine spark from which it has swirled.
God is the infinite eternal seed of all existence and can be experienced like this:
usually as an overwhelming love within us and as all power, knowledge and bliss.
So the seed and tree came from the Earth which itself has come from and exists in God
and to enquire where God has come from is useless if we haven't transcended this sod.
The limited mind of man has to merge into that unlimited universal mind of the Creator
only then can we know the original cause or final end of everything and of their Maker.
---------------------
Note:
This should remind one of the other similar paradox being that of 'the chicken and the egg'.
poem by George Krokos
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What if it rains?
A farmer sows the seed
Even if he doesn't know whether it will rain or not
He waits for the rain,
Patiently hoping that the clouds will come
That the rain will come
What if it doesn't rain?
It is painful to wait for the dark without clouds
You never know whether you should continue waiting or not
As the dark approaches without the cloud,
You can't help but ask yourself one question,
What if it doesn't rain?
What if it rains?
What if the seed becomes a tree?
What if the fruit grows and the birds build nests
What if the cooing of doves is heard in the land?
The dark is without clouds
But the farmer continues waiting
Hoping it will rain
If it does not rain
The seed will eventually die but the farmer will not
poem by Philani Zincume
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The Seed
In the spring
when the air has warmed.
I
planted a seed
a tiny seed.
I
along with my faith
to Mother Earth entrusted it.
I
hoped she would
nourish and coax the blossom
hidden within that seed so small.
To
spring forth in the summertime
with
its beauty its fragrance.
That all may behold and enjoy.
Until
autumn time
when back it returns
to a seed to sleep
to wait.
To be reborn.
poem by Kurt Hearth
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The Seed
The wind carried the seed
Into the air to who knows where
Across the weeds, floated the seed
Until to rest on the earth, which laid bare.
And then cried the seed upon the rise
Someday I, I will be a tree,
Liken my brothers, who will be like me
And I will grow to touch the sky.
The seed again journeyed upon the wind
Over the grass and wooded paths
Above the trees, cousins to him
Past the flowers who were his friends.
While he dreamed someday; he too would have many limbs.
The seed finally lighted upon the ground
From where he chose, so his mighty roots would grow
God will water me and give me light, he cried
He will also destroy my enemies and help me rise,
But then arrived a bird, who ate the seed.
Randy L. McClave
poem by Randy McClave
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The Seed
A seed
A bird had swallowed
While in fruit,
Had fallen in some rocky land
As Bird-droppings,
And sprouted into
A lovely tree,
With massive trunk
And boughs with verdant leaves,
And luscious fruits
As birds built nests
And wayfarers had shade from scorching sun!
A seed
A farmer sowed
In fertile land,
Ploughed by oxen
And sweat of brow
’neath scorching sun,
Did sprout also:
But ceased to grow
And withered
As the rains had failed
That year!
Although in both the cases
Seeds seemed similar,
Why did the farmer’s toil
Didn’t fructify?
Perhaps,
The bird had gulped
The best of fruits with seed
That grew despite the rocky soil!
Perhaps, the farmer’s work
Remained by God
Unblessed!
Man’s selfishness
At times ruins his labor great!
The heart of man matters!
Each seed
That’s sowed on earth
Grows by Heaven’s decree!
poem by John Celes
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The Magic Flower
THROUGH many days and many days
The seed of love lay hidden close;
We walked the dusty tiresome ways
Where never a leaf or blossom grows.
And in the darkness, all the while,
The little seed its heart uncurled,
And we by many a weary mile
Travelled towards it, round the world.
To the hid centre of the maze
At last we came, and there we found--
O happy day, O day of days!
--Twin seed-leaves breaking holy ground.
We dropped life's joys, a garnered sheaf,
And spell-bound watched, still hour by hour,
Magic on magic, leaf by leaf,
The unfolding of our love's white flower.
poem by Edith Nesbit
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To the Man After the Harrow
Now leave the check-reins slack,
The seed is flying far today -
The seed like stars against the black
Eternity of April clay.
This seed is potent as the seed
Of knowledge in the Hebrew Book,
So drive your horses in the creed
Of God the Father as a stook.
Forget the men on Brady's Hill.
Forget what Brady's boy may say.
For destiny will not fulfil
Unless you let the harrow play.
Forget the worm's opinion too
Of hooves and pointed harrow-pins,
For you are driving your horses through
The mist where Genesis begins.
poem by Patrick Kavanagh
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Genesis
In the outer world that was before this earth,
That was before all shape or space was born,
Before the blind first hour of time had birth,
Before night knew the moonlight or the morn;
Yea, before any world had any light,
Or anything called God or man drew breath,
Slowly the strong sides of the heaving night
Moved, and brought forth the strength of life and death.
And the sad shapeless horror increate
That was all things and one thing, without fruit,
Limit, or law; where love was none, nor hate,
Where no leaf came to blossom from no root;
The very darkness that time knew not of,
Nor God laid hand on, nor was man found there,
Ceased, and was cloven in several shapes; above
Light, and night under, and fire, earth, water, and air.
Sunbeams and starbeams, and all coloured things,
All forms and all similitudes began;
And death, the shadow cast by life's wide wings,
And God, the shade cast by the soul of man.
Then between shadow and substance, night and light,
Then between birth and death, and deeds and days,
The illimitable embrace and the amorous fight
That of itself begets, bears, rears, and slays,
The immortal war of mortal things that is
Labour and life and growth and good and ill,
The mild antiphonies that melt and kiss,
The violent symphonies that meet and kill,
All nature of all things began to be.
But chiefliest in the spirit (beast or man,
Planet of heaven or blossom of earth or sea)
The divine contraries of life began.
For the great labour of growth, being many, is one;
One thing the white death and the ruddy birth;
The invisible air and the all-beholden sun,
And barren water and many-childed earth.
And these things are made manifest in men
From the beginning forth unto this day:
Time writes and life records them, and again
Death seals them lest the record pass away.
For if death were not, then should growth not be,
Change, nor the life of good nor evil things;
Nor were there night at all nor light to see,
Nor water of sweet nor water of bitter springs.
For in each man and each year that is born
Are sown the twin seeds of the strong twin powers;
The white seed of the fruitful helpful morn,
The black seed of the barren hurtful hours.
And he that of the black seed eateth fruit,
To him the savour as honey shall be sweet;
And he in whom the white seed hath struck root,
He shall have sorrow and trouble and tears for meat.
And him whose lips the sweet fruit hath made red
In the end men loathe and make his name a rod;
And him whose mouth on the unsweet fruit hath fed
In the end men follow and know for very God.
And of these twain, the black seed and the white,
All things come forth, endured of men and done;
And still the day is great with child of night,
And still the black night labours with the sun.
And each man and each year that lives on earth
Turns hither or thither, and hence or thence is fed;
And as a man before was from his birth,
So shall a man be after among the dead.
poem by Algernon Charles Swinburne
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The Furrow And The Hearth
I
STRIDE the hill, Sower,
Up to the sky ridge,
Flinging the seed,
Scattering, exultant!
Mouthing great rhythms
To the long sea-beats
On the wide shore, behind
The ridge of the hillside.
Below in the darkness
The slumber of mothers,
The cradles at rest,
The fire-seed sleeping
Deep in white ashes!
Give to darkness and sleep,
O Sower, O Seer!
Give me to the earth
With the seed I would enter!
Oh, the growth through the silence
From strength to new strength;
Then the strong bursting forth
Against primal forces,
To laugh in the sunshine,
To gladden the world!
II
Who will bring the red fire
Unto a new hearth?
Who will lay the wide stone
On the waste of the earth?
Who is fain to begin
To build day by day
To raise up his house
Of the moist yellow clay?
There's clay for the making
Moist in the pit,
There are horses to trample
The rushes through it.
Above where the wild duck
Arise up and fly,
There one can build
To the wind and the sky.
There are boughs in the forest
To pluck young and green,
O'er them thatch of the crop
Shall be heavy and clean.
I speak unto him
Who in dead of the night
Sees the red streaks
In the ash deep and white;
While around him he hears
Men stir in their rest,
And the stir of the babe
That is close to the breast!
He shall arise,
He shall go forth alone,
Lay stone on the earth,
And bring fire to stone.
poem by Padraic Colum
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Love In Star Burst Breathes
with universal wonder
sail solar winds seed
love in star burst breathes
arching out spanning across
interstellar womb light space
dancing web cosmic stories
with universal wonder
embrace creation light seed
love into all life at light
speed too slow too slow seed
love into all life at thought
speed instant crosses solar systems
galaxy universe in an instant
in time crosses multi universes
in an instant of time love seeds
sent reach all receptive hearts
instantly love has no time to waste
sing bliss into multiple worlds
of life loving universal wonder
God is love love is transpermia life
love is life intergalactic thunder
poem by Terence George Craddock
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Wayfarer of Earth
Up, heart of mine,
Thou wayfarer of Earth!
Of seed divine,
Be mindful of thy birth.
Though the flesh faint
Through long-endured constraint
Of nights and days,
Lift up thy praise
To Life, that set thee in such strenuous ways,
And left thee not
To drowse and rot
In some thick-perfumed and luxurious plot.
Strong, strong is Earth,
With vigour for thy feet,
To make thy wayfaring
Tireless and fleet.
And good is Earth–
But Earth not all thy good,
O thou with seed of suns
And star-fire in thy blood.
And though thou feel
The slow clog of the hours
Leaden upon thy heel,
[Page 52]
Put forth thy powers.
Thine the deep sky,
The unpreëmpted blue,
The haste of storm,
The hush of dew.
Thine, thine the free
Exalt of star and tree,
The reinless run
Of wind and sun,
The vagrance of the sea!
poem by Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts
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The Flower of Death
The life is all we have; the death is all we need
It sets in our souls as an unfertilized seed
We know it will root soon, and take over our mind
And its stalk will sprout and wind
Death will take blossom, and it shall never fade it shall stay bright
And oh it shall be a beautiful sight, as it holds its petals into the night
And the leaves shall spread as green as green can be
And if you look close you will see
It's roots shall grow deep in the pot of eternity, in the dirt of the mind
The flower shall shine, so magnificent so kind
It's pollen will fly, will sour
And wait at the front of someone's door
The sun of the next world shall shine and nurture, the rain shall fall
Thanks to that the vines shall grow, and overcome the wall
The minerals of the soul will strengthen the warmth shall grow
This process shall grow, like snow falls, fast at first then slow
For the life is all we have; the death is all we need
It sets in our souls as an unfertilized seed
We know it will root soon, and take over our minds
And its stalk will sprout and wind
For now the flower shall bloom
The darkness shall leave, take the gloom
It shall leave us and we shall follow in the light of what's to be
Only then, we shall see
The flower of forever
As it takes root, you use it as a lever
Lifting you to the flower
And now you shall not cower
For you know this will spread and the flower shall grow shall thrive
And then you will know you are truly alive
As it takes root in your soul, and it shall becomes the power
For this is the blossom, this is the flower
The life is all our have; the death is all we need
It sets in our souls as an unfertilized seed
We know it will root soon, and take over our mind
And its stalk will sprout and wind
Bethany Hill
(This poem is not supposed to make you contemplate death, and I would not like to have people think that it is. It is just meant to show you that you should not fear death yet you should not reach for it but to take it when it is meant to come. Thank you)
poem by Bethany Maxwell
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Justice Denied In Massachusetts
Let us abandon then our gardens and go home
And sit in the sitting-room
Shall the larkspur blossom or the corn grow under this cloud?
Sour to the fruitful seed
Is the cold earth under this cloud,
Fostering quack and weed, we have marched upon but cannot
conquer;
We have bent the blades of our hoes against the stalks of them.
Let us go home, and sit in the sitting room.
Not in our day
Shall the cloud go over and the sun rise as before,
Beneficent upon us
Out of the glittering bay,
And the warm winds be blown inward from the sea
Moving the blades of corn
With a peaceful sound.
Forlorn, forlorn,
Stands the blue hay-rack by the empty mow.
And the petals drop to the ground,
Leaving the tree unfruited.
The sun that warmed our stooping backs and withered the weed
uprooted—
We shall not feel it again.
We shall die in darkness, and be buried in the rain.
What from the splendid dead
We have inherited —
Furrows sweet to the grain, and the weed subdued —
See now the slug and the mildew plunder.
Evil does overwhelm
The larkspur and the corn;
We have seen them go under.
Let us sit here, sit still,
Here in the sitting-room until we die;
At the step of Death on the walk, rise and go;
Leaving to our children's children the beautiful doorway,
And this elm,
And a blighted earth to till
With a broken hoe.
poem by Edna St. Vincent Millay
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A Dream Of Evolution....
shall a seed be
a seed forever?
do you not dream
someday that it shall
be planted
so that it can sprout
and grow
and then finally see
its flower
and fruit?
must the flower and fruit
be just the same
like the rest of the histories of
the other seeds
of their own form and kind?
must i hope
for an evolution
a seed turning
into a bee
a bee into
a butterfly into wind
into star?
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Paradise Seed
Where is the seed
Of the tree felled,
Of the forest burned,
Or living root
Under ash and cinders?
From woven bud
What last leaf strives
Into life, last
Shrivelled flower?
Is fruit of our harvest,
Our long labour
Dust to the core?
To what far, fair land
Borne on the wind
What winged seed
Or spark of fire
From holocaust
To kindle a star?
poem by Kathleen Jessie Raine
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Once And Once More
I silently bear the agony of waiting
Like the parched soil
That waits for the clouds to weep
The seed that craves in pain
For the first touch of rain!
I endure it flesh and soul
Watching in slow motion
The transformation of time
Stoically without a heartbreak
I survive the agony of a wait.
I know my dreams will arrive
The clouds will pour on the soil
Raindrops will pierce the seed
New life will burst forth
My wait will begin…once more!
poem by Pradip Chattopadhyay
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