THE WOOD

After so much forgetting

we are glad to sense we need our maze,

the lay of our veins, still closer than ever,

still warm, dark, unexplored

at its innermost core,

 

in our swishing on we

talk and hush –the same

in the quiet pressure of the oak’s stare,

inner sky arms holding

the squirrel’s stiletto stillness

 

and on the ground a scurrying, in the old leaves

while the garlic flowers breathe

their own grid of loosened chains

fully stinging and fulfilled, upward

through threading sunbeams.

 

We are glad to be walking drunk

with sun and shadow, with their

interweaving on each shred path

at the crossroads, on beehives of tracks

testing the heart,

 

our gaze both straight in front and inward

with its marvelling range of irises,

we are glad to have to make a choice,

glad of the roads not taken

for now, sure that the maze

 

will wait biding its time, mud sparking

on directions we’ll dig in the undergrowth

of our wish, just needing

this start back, its dark green

and, where knots of sap lure and sting,

 

the deep fluttering, the call

of barely seen wings.

 

This poem, written several years ago, has come to my mind reading the latest post in Crafty Green Poet's blog.