Just as saplings
will grow from the crevices in
a great boulder,
splitting the stone with persistence
and the gentle passage of time,
just as a stream can carve a canyon,
or the wind
can bend a tree to its will,
or a grain of sand will convince an oyster
to make a pearl,
it is not always the obvious
or the forceful
that create change or growth.
Sometimes it is nothing more than
the rhythm of small things,
the purposeful movement of one day to the next,
the continuous frictions of life,
that break us
or bend us
or cause us to grow.
We, too, are the roots, the water,
the sand, the seeds.
We are pushed and pulled
and we resist or adapt,
but we cannot separate ourselves
from the splendid wildness of the world.

by Lyn Asselta