Bearing Fruit in Old Age

This poem won a third place award in the Summer 2009 Time of Singing poetry contest: Trees.


Bearing Fruit In Old Age

One spring day a farmer
hammered eight nails,
long and rusty, into the trunk
of an aging apple tree
that quit bearing fruit.

That autumn the tired old tree,
having been goaded back to life,
produced a bumper crop of juicy
red apples, bigger and better
than had been seen before.

When asked what happened,
the farmer explained:
"Hammerin' in the rusty nails
gave it a shock to remind it
that its job is to produce apples."

                                 --Betty Spence

Grace Under Fire

A Poem I wrote several years ago during a time of family crisis.  I pray it will bless you as much as it did me during that particular time of my life.

Should I 
lose heart, O Lord,
grant me the courage of
a tiger jumping through a ring
of fire.
            --Betty Spence


**This poem was published in Time of Singing, Summer 2009.
Time of Singing is a high quality Christian poetry journal. Poems for submission may or may not have religious themes. But they must be suitable for Christian readers.
For subscription to TOS or for submissions contact editor,
Lora Zill, at Time of Singing, P.O. Box 149, Conneaut Lake, PA 16316 or timesing@zoominternet.net.