If I am a leaf (poem)

If I am only one leaf

Of a million 

On a tree this year 

That bears a million different leaves every year 

For a hundred years

In a forest of ten thousand trees

On a globe full of forests

In a galaxy with other earths

With other forests

In a universe of galaxies

If I exist for just a moment 

If I breath and live and no one sees me

If I am non-essential

If I can die and no one knows

Or sees

Except for a few other leaves on my twig

If I can fall to the ground and be buried and trampled

And never seen again

In an ocean of yellow brown leaves 

That crinkle and waste away

And remember only briefly the green summer when they drank in the sun

And turned light to sugar

And fed the veins of the tree

And blew in the wind

If I am that leaf

Then let me use that brief time that I have

These few breaths

These bright days

To sing with my short life

The song of the One who sees me