Fall Clean Up Time

It is fall clean up in my garden, Lord.
I'm feeling guilty, sad, lonesome and blue.
The grasses and the weeds have over run
The lovely flowers, planted there for you.

Is this a mirror of my life, dear Lord?
Have all my kinder deeds been overcome
By ugly thoughts and hurting acts and words?
Wild dandelion crowds out chrysanthemum.

Forgive me, Lord, if I have failed to tend
My garden in the manner that I should.
I'd claim the days I spent so foolishly
And use them gainfully now, if I could.

Now that I'm in the autumn of my years
I hope to take each day I have in store
And spend each precious second of that time
More usefully than I have done before.

Now as I pull the baneful weeds and grass,
Removing each intruder one by one,
I hope to stand before you judgement day
Well kept, weed free, with all my gardening done.

By Joyce 9/7/02