In Colorado, we sow our seeds after Mother’s Day. Then we wait. It seems to take forever for those seedlings to pop their little green heads out of the soil, but they eventually do, so we water and weed and water and weed…and after a while, they mature into plants and therein is the promise, that the probable outcome of seed-planting is fruit (or vegetables or flowers). Things can happen along the way, like hailstorms or grasshoppers, but we must plant anyway, because one thing is certain–no seedlings will emerge if the seeds are never sown.

Robert Frost wrote this in 1920 (from “Putting in the Seed”).
“…Slave to a springtime passion for the earth.
How Love burns through the Putting in the Seed
On through the watching for that early birth
When, just as the soil tarnishes with weed,
The sturdy seedling with arched body comes
Shouldering its way and shedding the earth crumbs.”

Life’s like this. We plant seeds into the lives around us, nurture them, deal with the hardships, and marvel at the miracle of growth. All that work is not only good for the seed…but beautifully, also for the seed planter.