the woodpecker’s nails of love
a poem written by Sarina Stokes
I wrote this poem on the Monday morning I had surgery on my wrist; 5 days after having broken it, which just so happened to be on Ash Wednesday. (Can we just give an “Amen” and “YeeHaw” to the good providence of our God?) As I sat on my porch shortly after the sun rose, with Jesus sitting at my right and my cup of coffee at my left, I began to hear the sound of a woodpecker, among other crawling critters that sought to welcome me that bright day. The continued graces of profound peace and joy flooded my soul as Jesus showed me how I am to remain this Lent: resting in the shade of His life-sustaining apple tree.
the sound of a woodpecker
rang in my ears,
peckering the bark of a dormant tree.
the arising of spring teases the horizon;
a red sun sits upon his head.
my red-headed friends morning
business soon turns to the drumming
of a hammer:
nails to a tree in the shape of a cross.
i enfold it into an embrace within me.
my hands outstretch as i imagine
my beaked friend peckering me
to the wood of a cross;
a peckering of kisses,
a gentle pressing.
perhaps i do not need these nails
because it is the hands of My King
who holds me there.
little woodpecker, friend,
were you there in Eden?
would God, the Creator, have walked
in the garden with Adam and Eve
hearing your beak to bark
as a foreshadow:
the disobedience at the apple tree?
would you, little bird, have been
one of the prodigious instruments
in the symphonic orchestration
done by our Good Conductor?
a Song in the life of what
should-have-been and
now-has-been-lost?
the sound of my own nails continued
as they echoed across the meadow,
rippling upon the lake.
the cross casting shadow
in this garden wilderness.
as I hung there with my Savior
and two-winged, red-headed friend
the breeze tickles the nape of my neck
and chimes carry in the wind.
rest floods my soul.
the cross becomes an invitation
from what has-been-lost
to what is-made-new.
my Good King Creator invites me
to abide in the shade of His Tree,
drinking His bloody sap
which flows down the bark of Life
as the woodpecker continues
to hammer Him with nails of Love.
“rest under this new apple tree.”