The Olive Tree

The Olive Tree

2/25/25  Debbie Blane

 

These men that come with machetes and chainsaws

Have no respect

For

Culture,

For heritage,

For age.

It is a pity that those that seek to steal this land,

And me on it,

Have no understanding of what it is

The treasure it is

The history it is

That they are

Stealing.

I am a proud olive tree

Bent with age

And yet still producing

Because that is what we do.

I was here when Jesus of Nazareth was here,

Some of us are 2,000 years old.

I have seen armies come and go,

Crucifixions,

Judaism maturing,

Infant Christianity,

And eventually even Islam in the cradle.

I live on the Mt. of Olives in East Jerusalem,

The home of all three of these religions.

I have fed many generations of faithful

And many generations of those who have no understanding

Of what faith

Or faithful

Means.

It all depends

Who

Won

The

Last

War.

 

Now in the West Bank,

Little girls hold their aprons out

And carry the bounty of other olive trees

To their parents

In the ancestral homes

For making

Olive oil

Soap

And for eating right off of the stem.

We don’t know for how long.

Men called “settlers” come

With soldiers facilitating their lawlessness

Cutting the branched off

And uprooting

The olive trees.

They have no idea

The history

The treasure.

Olive trees live thousands of years

But not when ignorant robbers

Pull them up by their roots

And throw them onto fires.

 

The olive trees of the Mt. of Olives in

East Jerusalem

Remember

The night

When

Jesus

Was

Betrayed.

He too was pulled up by his roots

And nailed to a cross.