I did not light this chalice. 

I only carried 
a flame I found 
already burning, 

a flame 
already spreading 
its light like love. 

Let each of us 
carry this flame 
out into the world. 

Let each of us 
live to shine 
the light of love. 

Let each of us 
work to brighten 
every corner. 

Let each of us 
spark the flame of hope 
in every heart. 

Let each of us 
keep the flame alive, 
pass it forward. 

If we are to be keepers of the flame, we need to nurture it, make sure it keeps burning.

We all have heard about bonsai, miniature trees, grown in small containers, carefully shaped to fit in a special place inside rooms. If we are to pass our flames along, we shouldn’t hide our flames under bushels, or even in lamps that we keep inside houses, or even churches. No, we need bigger flames, brighter flames we can carry in full sun. Instead of table-top trees, we need full-size trees we can grow in our yards.

The house that my wife and I lived in when our boys were growing up had crape myrtles along the back fence. If you have seen crape myrtles that are grown in public areas—esplanades, parking lots, outside office buildings—you haven’t really seen crape myrtles. Public planters send out work crews to give the trees 50s-style flattop haircuts, and prune everything above a certain height. After years of pruning, public crape myrtles look like skinny, deranged Joshua trees, sprouting flowers.

We bought that first house in December. We moved in shortly before our baby’s first Christmas. By then, the crape myrtles were bare. We fell in love with the house after dark; it was the floor plan, not the crape myrtles, that sealed the deal.

Whoever planted and pruned those crape myrtles, had made sure that they were trees. Oh, what trees! They reached above the telephone and cable lines, then arched into the back yard. By Summer solstice, the trees were in full bloom. Clusters of blossoms would make the tips of branches hang low. They would turn the trees into a vault of leaves and flowers, that arched like stained glass above our heads.

At our old house, 
crape myrtles, blooming, blazing 
watermelon reds. 

We sheltered once inside 
the arch of their branches, 

the shade of their cloister. 

Achieving that crape myrtle sanctuary took a lot of work—bonsai, on a grand scale! To keep the trees springing towards the sky, we had to prune the suckers that would grow from the bases of the trees, suckers that longed to be bushes, and sapped the strength of the trees. We had to cut off the branches that wanted to grow out, instead of up. We had to keep reminding the crape myrtles to soar and hang. We thinned some branches, to give other branches room to grow, room to blossom, room to light up the vault over our heads.

Let us shape 
our lives like crape myrtles, 
let them leap 

into the sky 
like flames, cast 

a glorious light.

Bio: Gary S. Rosin