It is one twenty-nine
and my heart heaves a sigh
for my ears have just heard
some great sad news of a bird.

For my whole life I have known
a dear sweet girl who has shown
gentle spirit and love
with a joy from above.

Four some weeks and a go,
I spent five days away
with her sister and her
in a college alone.

There she told me
she had thought
of one day soon going away
to a state so very far
to teach for two months or more.

I chose not to think very much
of the news she had sent
for I would miss and grow sad
besides I doubted she’d go.

A couple days ago
she came to my house and said
that she may – may go
but I did not think so.

She is a gentle young bird
to go would be such a stretch
for such a quiet, shy girl
was this dear little bird.
(Thought I)

It was two twenty-nine
when I in my sleep
had awoke and had heard
“he told me she will go”.

It seems strange how I had awoke
right at that one twenty-nine
just when my mother had said
to my father that it was a “yes”.

At once my heart cried out
and at once my thoughts flowed
with the days of the past
and the days to bid ‘bye.

Our good schooldays together
would no longer occur
and the deep talks on beds
were to become rarer in time.

My heart cries out a bit
because to me she has been
the friend I tell all
even of an apricotpie.

Oh dear Lord of above
shelter this bird all days
May she trust in your love
through all her hardships to come.

May she leave and make friends
and learn abundantly more
about the hearts of the lost
and how to win them to Christ.

May she depend on your grace
to be enough for her days
Days of discouragement and loneliness
that are sure coming her way.

Help her to seek your holiness
and to still her soul
for the Word every day
as she works and learns.

This I all pray
as this morning I reach
for the map and trace where
she will be – so very far away.

I will miss you, girl!

_____________
Written in the spring for a friend. Of course, not really poetry. But I am posting this because I feel like as each of us grow older, we are experiencing changes and goodbyes - some more heart-rending than others. We see friends we have grown up with - become adults and leave on mission trips, adventures, college, etc. I know that all of us will someday find all our friends away to their adventure, and us - at home. We will wonder, "What is my purpose?" But hold! Remember that God knows and has planned our future!