Autumn Blaze

We dug the hole one quiet fall,
The leaves around us red and small.
A sapling slight, with roots still bare,
We gave it space, we gave it care.

Autumn Blaze, its name be true,
A fire that someday might break through.
We watched it lean, then helped its stand,
As winds moved strongly across our land.

Now look—it towers, bold and wide,
Its branches stretching toward the sky.
While others stall or wither in place,
Ours climbed with calm and patient grace.

It wasn’t just the sun and rain,
But hands that worked through joy and strain.
Like marriage, like a love once bright,
It rose because we did it right.

But love’s not just what’s built and grown—
It’s what you keep, and claim, and own.
And somewhere in the in-between,
We lost the roots once so serene.

The tree still thrives, tall as a prayer,
While silence lingers in the air.
And I can’t help but see the cost—
Of something strong that still was lost.

We could have trimmed, we could have healed,
We could’ve fought, we could’ve kneeled.
Like tending bark or guarding flame,
Love asks for more than just a name.

So now that tree, it holds my gaze—
A monument to better days.
To what can grow and still be gone—
A blaze that burned, and then moved on.

© 2025 Shawn Oen. All rights reserved