Even the word surrender
suggests some agency,
but perhaps
what is asked of us
is zero. Perhaps
we are like the seed
of the lodgepole pine
that opens through
no effort of its own.
It needs the heat
of a wildfire blaze.
Then the seed is released
into the very blackened,
desolate world
that seemed hellbent
on destroying it,
but it is the carbon-rich
soil left by the fire
that feeds the seed
and helps the tree grow.
No surrender.
No effort.
Who could ask
for the fire?
The seed did not.
It did nothing at all.
And now, the pine,
how green, how tall.