Not even Judas

Posted on October 26, 2020 by William Everett

William J. Everett's Blog

Hidden on the mountainsides of Appalachia

  lives beneath majestic canopies

  a tree they call the Judas tree.

 Its purple buds begin the spring

  break through the bark betrayed by winter’s silver hands.

 And as the sun burns higher in the sky

  the leaves

  turned green

  turned red

  like hearts

  begin to tremble, shake, and beat.

 Humbled underneath the shade of oak and ash it greets

  the seal of Solomon

  the trillium

  the ginseng with its fabled powers.

 Beside it bows the dogwood

  bright bracts cut short by blood-brown marks,

  its body twisted with a gnarled grace.

 The redbud

  legacy of our betrayal

  brings forth the rosy lips of spring.

 The dogwood

  emblem of God’s suffering

  whispers in the wakening gloom

  not even Judas lies beyond the love of God.