None of us could explain
the pine that suddenly grew higher
and higher until its limbs
disappeared in blue
and we heard it stretching higher.
We cried out, watching for God
to come down, but nothing appeared
and slowly we calmed.
From all countries we gathered,
pressing hands and cheeks to the bark,
feeling infinity's faint shiver.
The climbers said there were new worlds
to settle, but in a few months
they all came back. The tree
kept going, they told us,
and it wasn't fear that stopped them,
but looking down day after day
as the curving sunlit swirl of Earth
shrank in the dark
until one hand could cover it—
if home wasn't there, they realized,
it wasn't anywhere.