CREATIVITY AND VOICES
The Sea Rose- A poem by Pat Deegan
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- Published: Thursday, 03 July 2014 10:37
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A poem about The Sea Rose by Pat Deegan
It is springtime and hope is everywhere. It is springtime and it feels like all living things are trembling into being, still wet and new and fragile and determined to put down roots and grow.
I think of a sea rose I watched growing out at a beach near my home this past summer. It is a fragile and tender life, that sea flower. I love to see it. At dawn it moves in a slow upsway as it turns toward the morning star. That sea rose is a light seeker. It bends toward the light. It is a light-seeker whose roots reach way down into the darkness of the earth. In fact, it was in darkness that his new life began.
Way back in January and February, when the icy winds lashed across those dunes and the days were short and the light gave no warmth, even then, way down under the ground, this new life was waiting. Nobody could see it, nobody was there to witness it, and yet this promise of a sea flower waited. It waited in that icy darkness for the sands to begin to thaw. It waited for the rains to come and loosen the earth. And then, ever so slowly, it began to stir. Moving one grain of sand at a time, it began to grow.
It did not grow straight toward the light at first. No. First its growth sought a downward course, reaching, stretching, blindly groping through shifting sands to find a solid place. A place to be rooted. A good soil to cling to and to be nurtured by. A home soil that could sustain it even in driving rains and tormenting winds. And then, having rooted itself in this way, the sea rose began its journey toward the light. Poking through the darkness, that sea flower emerged tiny and lovely and insistent and courageous. On frail and trembling limbs, this small thing rose to a new life…
That sea rose teaches us a lot about hope. It teaches us that hope emerges out of darkness. It teaches us that hope can grow in nurturing environments that allow one to become rooted and secure. And I have come here today to celebrate the hope symbolized by that sea rose…