Wind-Driven Change

Wind-Driven Change

Jeanette W. Stickel

How quickly fog rolls in,
draping our cypress trees with white filament.
Fog-rivers flow by my window then disappear,

swept away by wind. Change is constant
on the coast. Wind-driven wisps of white
come and go, shifting the scene

and like the view outside my window,
I also change. I’m the cypress clothed in fog.
My outer form has shifted from its past

but what remains is who I’ve always been,
though molded by wind of love and loss,
and shrouded by a filament of grief and joy—

their intensity is etched on my face and form—
and yet I stand rooted to a faith that holds me fast
as the solid cypress behind my home.

Some day we both will fall and our bodies
will enhance the soil where new life will rise
and winds of change cannot harm us.

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Jeanette W. Stickel
Poet & Educator

Jeanette has received awards for her poetry at the Mendocino Writers Conference and through the Utmost Christian Poetry Contest. In addition to poetry, she writes for children and has used poetry and stories to instill in her students a love of language.

Photography by Branimir Balogovic