A POEM A DAY - PROMISE

This winter I planted a number of acorns I picked up in the woods where they littered the ground around the holm oak trees. I followed instructions and put them in a moist bag in the fridge for a few weeks, then with my grandsons help, planted them in the long pot where my mint grows. Months past and we were delighted to see tiny oak plants spouting, with the familiar spiked holly leaves of the holm oak. Some weeks later I decided to transplant them to their own pots and was amazed to find that the inch high oak had a root at least 10 times as long, wrapping around the planter. I worried that moving such a long root would damage the plant but so far they are still alive and hopefully getting used to their new pots. 

In the wild where the earth is often baked hard and dry, it takes rain and the passing of an animal to squelch an acorn into the soil. Baby oaks grow very slowly, shadowed out by the faster growing, invasive pine. I hope one day to take my little oak plants and find a good open space on the hillside to give them a chance to grow and one day fulfill their promise to become a mighty oak. In that tiny acorn is the promise of our future, one day my grandchildren will walk the hills and this little oak will have grown into a tree. 

© 2020 Jacqueline Knight Cotterill.  All rights reserved.