The Seasons of Indiana

Oh, what a beautiful sight my Indiana Homeland.
Your beauty from season to season holds true in strength.

As spring comes, melting snow,
The trees bud and flowers grow.
As God spreads his love over the land,
The earth sprouts new life to grow and expand.

The air warms, and animals awake.
They rise, they stretch, and begin to make
Joyful sounds and songs of praise,
That God keeps true to what He says.

He kept them warm from bitter wind.
For those who slept, He gave places to sleep in.
He protected the stores of nuts for squirrels.
He protected everyone: mothers, fathers, boys, and girls.

So, into the spring, they run about.
They eat and they play and sing and shout,
For it is now the days of spring,
And Earth’s wonderful life can rise again.

But spring passes by and turns to summer,
Leaves grow out and show their splendor.
The beauty of Indiana is shown,
In that this is a land that God does own.

He paints all the land with flowers,
And He pours on them rays of sun and gentle showers.
For the trees, he gives to the animals as homes,
But the animals only can rent, because God owns.

For how can anyone, man or beast,
Own the beauty of the land in the least?
No, God is the Creator of this wonder,
A gift so great that none can plunder.

As spring leas to summer, so must summer to fall.
The leaves come alive with all,
The colors you could ever think of.
This here is God painting his love.

The trees are his canvas, the leaves his palette.
You should go to Brown County to see his exhibit,
And there are many such exhibits throughout Indiana’s land,
But they dwindle year-by-year as cities expand.

Maybe some of the splendor can be taken away.
It is up to us to keep the destruction at bay.
As we loose nature, we loose beauty in life,
We loose serenity, and some calm for our strife.

Observe the beauty of nature while you can,
For God soon wipes his canvas clean with the sweep of a hand.
The leaves fall to the ground, the trees grow bare,
As God cools the land and cools the air.

Winter comes to wipe the slate clear,
But God remembers the animals, squirrels and deer.
He keeps them warm and gives them food for strength,
So they may survive winter in its bitter length.

The animals may sleep, but God does not.
He protects the homes and every little spot,
Where an animal sleeps and waits in its den,
Until the day that God brings spring to Indiana again.

by Bryan Fortriede