Musings And My Grandfather's Orchard Poem by Raymond Farrell

Today
As I sit
Under the locust tree
I think of my grandfather
And the brief window of time
The two of us shared
Him frail and disabled
With Parkinson's disease
And me just a child
Who appreciated him
Without the jadedness
That comes with age
Yet now I wish
I had met him
In his prime
He had a reputation
As a local strong man
Who could perform
Great feats of strength
And yet was known
As a calm man
And now for some reason
I also think
Of the orchard
On the farm
He had planted and tended
Over the decades
How as he neared death
It had begun
To look to my young eyes
Somewhat abandoned, unkept
The grass was no longer mowed
The trees in need of pruning
There were apples
Of different kinds
But many were wormy
He never voiced his concern
Too sick or disabled
To do anything about it
So maybe he had resigned himself
To the inevitable
My uncle
Who had taken over the farm
Was too busy and not interested
In keeping up the orchard
Looking back
I think he made a mistake
And now that the property
Has changed hands
A number of times
Even the apple trees
what few are left
Are broken down
And yield no fruit
Of any value
I think there is a lesson
In all this musing
The Ancients
Thought they wrote for the ages
For generations to come
And a few
Of those who wrote back then
Are still read today
But the vast majority
Are long gone
And what they wrote
Has turned to mold and rot and dust
And the poems they read
Have died in the echo
Of a distant age
And they like us
Wrote for each other
Those who are alive
In our time
And there is no guarantee
Posterity will ever know
Or appreciate
Anything we have written or done
But if we serve
To enlighten our fellow man today
Or try to motivate others
To do better today
And lend a helping hand
Be a guiding light
Even if only a flickering candle
And try to live
In peace and harmony
With others and the environment
It will have been enough
Even if a generation from now
What we have written
Is abandoned and bears no fruit.