In the forest, light falls like shattered glass,
cutting shadows into my path. I step carefully,
as if walking on the bones of my ancestors.
The wind whispers in a language I almost remember,
was it my mother’s voice or the rustle of leaves?
I am lost in the green lungs of the earth,
breathing in time with the trees.
Each inhale draws in centuries of growth and decay,
each exhale releases a small piece of my history.
I wonder if the forest can taste the salt
of distant oceans on my breath, sense the echoes
of war in the trembling of my fingers.
The bark of an old oak feels like my grandmother’s hands,
rough with years of labor, yet somehow still gentle.
I press my cheek against it, seeking wisdom
in its rings, hoping to decipher the code
of survival etched in its core.
Sunlight filters through canopy gaps,
illuminating motes of dust like stars in daylight.
I reach out to touch them, these fleeting galaxies,
remembering how my father once told me
that we are all made of stardust.
As twilight approaches, the forest grows heavy
with secrets. Shadows lengthen, reaching for me
like the arms of ghosts. I am both afraid and eager
to be embraced by this darkness, to disappear
into the soft, fertile night of forgotten things.
I emerge from the woods carrying slivers of light
embedded in my skin, fragments of a language
I’m still learning to speak. The city awaits,
a constellation of neon and dreams, but part of me
remains rooted in that quiet, green eternity.
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