Sower

Jean Giono has recorded the story of Elzeard Bouffier who devoted his life to planting acorns in a desolate area in France, after the deaths of his wife and child. Forests grew, and the landscape was reclaimed.
In ancient Greece, the oak groves surrounding the temple of Zeus at Dodona were thought to be endowed with a gift of prophecy, and the sound of their leaves interpreted as oracles.
Most change is slow, tries not to happen.
As with seeds, for instance, which half-
ask to be mislaid, mixed up with stones,
give birth to life twisting back on itself,
as the parable warns and promises.
With hope, without expectation, a man
buries acorns in a hillside, many hillsides —
serving the dream, free to forget them
as he hollows and fills, each one
a few minutes of his life, no more.
After, he sees the rain in a new way,
feels the sun's heat entering earth
as it enters his flesh. When he is old,
there are oak groves. Not for gods
to make prophecies, or for humans
to possess by so much as a glance.
They are for themselves: — root-fibres
tapering towards cells indistinguishable,
at last, from earth; axis of heartwood;
unoracular leaves transforming
without speech, offering neither warning
nor promise, powerless to bear
messages from the gods, withstand human
confusion: — not waiting, not enduring,
not indestructible. But there.