Almost Ten Years Later ... a Few Struggling Trees

I look at the images of personnel readying the World Trade Center site for a presidential visit.  Amid an awful lot of steel and concrete, stand a few struggling trees. I couldn't help feeling a bit sad that in the wake of that terrible terrible day in our nation's history, it has taken us ten years to get this far. On my way to the mailbox, I saw the path to consensus and change in the garden taking a very different course. As if overnight, spring's burst of yellow is gone —  gracefully fading into the hot pinks of trees and bushes all over the neighborhood. Birds have been busy at the feeder and already long-stemmed grass is popping up at its base. I spend a scant half-hour tidying up, and more often than not in my haste, I accidentally root out some of the oenothera with the weeds. By the time I turn to go, I could swear that sturdy late-spring flowering perennial is already straining to fill the holes made by my clumsiness. There is a message in all that somewhere. Whatever it is, even those fragile new trees speak of healing and that is a hopeful thing.