Jane Hirshfield

The poem is a way to say yes to existence in all of its perplexities and all of its difficulties and all of its joys.

Yes.

And I feel, hearing that story, I feel the enormous grace and courage the speaker brings to reality and to knowing that whatever the future brings, whatever fracturing of the earth is going on right now, to still love this world, to still love existence,

That is the antidote to despair.

And there is a great, to use an old-fashioned word, gallantry.

The gallantry of that description is that even in the face of not being able to change a loss that is coming,

you love where you are, you love the beauty of this world, and that lets a person keep opening their eyes every day, that love, because otherwise we fall into despair.

I will.

So I live in Mill Valley, a place on Mount Tamalpais, north of San Francisco, that was logged of all of its trees after the 1906 earthquake and fire.

But redwoods come back from the roots.

They are resilient creatures.

So, trees.

It is foolish to let a young redwood grow next to a house.

Even in this one lifetime, you will have to choose.

That great calm being, this clutter of soup pots and books, already the first branch tips brush at the window.

Softly, calmly, immensity taps at your life.

Thank you, Science Friday, for always including a bit of poetry during National Poetry Month each year.