Winter Trees

by Florence Glucksman

Stripped and bare to the eye
Your majesty shorn by time
You stand versus gray sky
Naked and exposed
Hardly a look, as we pass you by
Rushing against the cold
A bird alights
only to continue, its southward flight.
Slight and lean you seem to us
Without your greens, so plush.
Obtuse, we do not grasp your strength
In the winter of your life, you stand strong not weak
Shedding the fatness of fall
Gone the charms and freshness of youth
In their place, you rise, a giant
Integrity and age, your might,
Your power, you endure
Fullness and beauty renewed
You bear the fruit of yet another cycle
G-d continues in you.
In old age
Can man wish
But to live through
his seed??