If seedlings are waking up in clay pots on my balcony,
if there are tiny, fragile seedlings
that despite their tininess and fragility
still manage to express their true nature,
just as distant stars express theirs;
If this expression of stars and seedlings
is inevitable, yet innocent;
And if a seedling, a wisp of green, a mere tendril,
can heave aside a boulder, its opponent,
which is a crumb of earth,
And the crumb can’t resist —
If the will to life and its expression are that powerful;
if the force of life animates everything and
everything will continue in its path
without regard to me or my existence—
Then I know I am, and will be, safe;
I know that I need only do the next right thing
and that the next right thing will present itself
and I will recognize it.
And I need only do this next right thing
as completely
and with as much sense of inevitability
and with the same innocence
as do the seedlings in the ground or the distant stars.