Parables

Seems rather less than impressive:
The cedar of Yahweh and Ezekiel
Reduced to the mustard shrub of Jesus

Still, there are birds clustered in the branches
Like handfulls of feathered bluster and fluff
Chattering as they turn this way and that
Still not sure what to do
Now that they’re here

Less than overwhelming, to be sure
Those birds gathered in the midst of the wispy,
Yellow-tipped tangle, tiny seeds
Littering the dry earth beneath

Pliny (the Elder, if you must know) warned about those seeds,
Letting them fall, because they germinate at once, and after that once
You can barely rid the place of them

Inexplicably larger it grows–
Not a cedar of Lebanon, its top plucked
And replanted in human regality
But a mystery, banal and ugly from a distance
Blurred in the blinking sun
Yet calm within, even as it bears
Its heavy Family name:
Cruciferae–as if it had heard something about wood
That the cedar cannot see
Beyond the forest
Below the trees
Clapping their hands for mustard seeds

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