Susquehanna Meditations: Acorn Mast

Acorn Mast

So many. 

Crunching them on the sidewalk

The meat of the nut squished, squeezing out all its oils and juices and fats

Its cap broken into chips

So many

Cracking them beneath your hiking boots along the trail

The trail where the oak trees tower

So many that your trail-bike slips and slides as your ride over.

Acorns abundant

My boom-time

White Tail and black squirrel boon-time

So too chipmunk and turkey and jay

Chew up the juicy ones

Store the bitter ones into the ground to let the water soak them sweet

Acorns piled and clumped beneath a grinning oak

My tree seed

Too many for them to take away

Especially when there are fewer of them when I’ve been lean these few years

It takes a lot of energy for flowers and fruits and nuts

I must feed for them to feed

Time for me to make it up to them

Those who can

My gift

Life feeds life

Oak tree proud, with limbs outstretched

Robust and well fed

My chance to feed those who rely on me

Especially through the winter

Look what I have done

So many that the squirrels and deer haven’t had a chance to carry them all away

An acorn mast

Why it happens puzzles you

This tree doesn’t care why or how

Just cares about what

Just one of those things

Cycle within a cycle

The point is to produce

Reproduce

Yield fruit

Yield nut

Be fruitful and multiply

So many that rather than taken for food, another oak will grow

And another

And another

And another

We will cover this mountain and fill this valley

We are called Penns-sylvania for good reason

With my friends hickory, beech, hawthorn, and elm

Outpacing predation

Making sure the oak tree grows

The yearning to propagate

Generate

Germinate

The trees of life

Where would you be, they be, without me?

Acorn to its anchor root to its kernel swelling to its shoot to its sapling to its tree to more acorns

From one to many

From small to vast

The oak tree and acorn the same

Born of promise

Potential released

Unstoppable

It is nature’s way of doing it.

The wind help shake them loose

Along with the frost and chill

Sign of a robust tree

No guarantee of an acorn mast next year

It takes time to do it right

Build up the resources

And then burst out

Burst forth

No holding back

Must release

My gift