By S. E. Reid
Aside from being one of the most widely recognizable saints in history, Saint Francis of Assisi is typically used as an enduring symbol of holy ecology and love for Creation.
According to the legends about his incredible life, Francis preached to the birds, extended compassion to a ferocious wolf, and surrounded himself with a vision of Creation as a vast family, one to which all beings – human and nonhuman – belong. His role in church history gives us a glimpse into a restored Eden, where all things live in peace and grace is our common language.
Today you often find his tonsured statue in gardens, and he is usually depicted with attentive birds, gentle deer, or a tamed wolf. The stories surrounding him and his strange life are numerous, too numerous to recount here, but make no mistake: just like most saints, Francis was a complicated, imperfect person whom God used for incredible things.
No matter the details, the iconography of Saint Francis is a reminder to examine and challenge ourselves in our service to this Earth, given to us by God as the most tangible gift we could ever receive. I wrote this poem to honor that gift.
the birds in my garden are full of gossip, today as they tell and retell the only sermon they know by heart: the one the saint told to their ancestors’ ancestors their mothers’ mothers their fathers’ fathers passed down like a story, and now they preach to me every morning. from the branches of the baring cherry tree and the fenceposts of the garden and the top of the greenhouse and the leaning evergreens they speak to me of the love of God and the sweetness of seed and the grief of leaving summer’s warmth behind tiny proselytizers to the goodness of the earth in a tongue only they remember.
