The Wind and the Dogwood Tree *(An Easter Poem)

A thundering, stampede of blackness,

A twisting, bucking spectre, pawing at

Calvary Hill. That's what the townspeople

Called the hill topped with the lone Dogwood Tree.

The twisted little tree braced against the wind,

Its crossed-shaped blossoms streaming like pale tears.

"Was it your wood they used to make Christ's cross,"

The wind shrieked. "Was the cross He carried to

Calvary made of your wood? Did they pound the nails

through His hands and feet into a cross of

Dogwood? When He died, mocked and tortured,

Did He hang from the wood of a Dogwood Tree?"

"Yes," the little tree whispered, "but it was not

I who murdered Christ. Even in His death throes, he

Sensed my sorrow to be so used, and granted me

Mercy and peace. He turned me into a small, twisted

Tree that never again could be made into a cross.

He crowned me with soft, cross-shaped blossoms

With a heart of thorns to forever remind all of the

Agony he willingly bore. He knew that I grieved to be so used.

No, It was not I who crucified Christ.

I have not the skill to shape a cross,

I have not the hands to pound nails into living flesh,

I have not the heart to crucify the Gentle Redeemer and Shepard of men."

*The Legend of the Dogwood tree is not Biblically based, but is a piece of beautiful literature

that grew from the story of the crucifiction.

http://www.gotquestions.org/legend-dogwood.html