The Woods: A Prologue by Loralee Clark

 

Matheus Bertelli

The Woods: A Prologue

In all my memories I am eight.

In spring, I walk past the boulders (no yelling)

piled at the edge of the back lawn, (no judgement)

out to the sinkhole filled with water,

inky with leaf tannins, to pretend

I was fishing; stick in hand (no baiting)

to flip the stacks of leaves at (no traps)

the bottom, pollywogs darting away.

In summer, years upon years of pine needles

cushioning the ground, (no slamming doors)

leading the way to a neighbor’s house; even 

if I was off by a few minutes, (no slapping)

I still got out to the other side.

I was never lost.     

In winter, the snowmobile tracks behind

the Cook’s trailer, curving in arcs through (no loneliness)

their property, ours, and the Holt’s.  Miles 

of mechanical doodling.

Once the ponds froze over, Stacy, Stephen 

and I would skate, avoiding the dried clumps of grass

sticking up through the ice; coming in (no martyrdom)

only when we could no longer

feel our toes and the dusk

made it hard to see. (no shouting)

In the woods: freedom,

imagination, tools for important work.  (no neglect)

Calming, predictable through the seasons

but surprising when a bird perched close, (no threats)

when a ladybug would land, when I saw 

a piece of wood chewed by a porcupine. (no intentional

                                                                        silence)

"The Woods: A Prologue" is from A Harmony in the Key of Trees: A Healing Myth (Dancing Girl Press).

© Loralee Clark

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Loralee Clark

Loralee Clark resides in Virginia; her website is sites.google.com/view/loraleeclark.  She has a book forthcoming this year, Solemnity Rites, with Prolific Pulse Press LLC, and has most recently been published in Periwinkle Pelican, White Stag Journal, Chewers by Masticadores, Nude Bruce Review, Lucky Leaves, Everscribe, The Rockford Review, and Soul Poetry, Prose and Art Magazine.

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