Languid branches above, cool air below,
A path in the forest – so much to know…
Ageless trees growing to the sky,
You can speak to the dimness and the birds reply,
You can speak to the dimness and the birds reply…
Unshackled, his soul struggled to find any grounding limits.
His mind became filled with malevolent visions and wandering spirits.
Trying to find a way amidst the grimness,
Living beyond the fringes, existing in the dimness…
Like an unstable visitor, an uncommitted pawn…
To the darkness of the forest, he was progressively drawn…
The cold, the damp, the itchy skin…
He slept on its verges and explored what grew within…
Emotions struggled to be felt – brooding anger and misplaced love…
Sunlight filtered down from the canopy above.
Through dangling branches and across uneven ground,
He entered this place of subdued light and softened sound.
Like an ethereal magnet, the forest drew him in,
What are the clues, how far does one go, where to begin?
At times the leaves were quiet and still…
He could feel the night and the approaching chill.
Inside he felt the raging hate and his body seethed,
In those dark hours the forest breathed…
No longer did he seem to care for anything.
He withdrew from everyone and everything…
The spirits merged with the trees and the vines,
He could see the faces of the dead; he could read the signs…
They came to him in the night, as he dreamed,
And they spoke to him, or so it seemed, or so it seemed…
He ate little and his body grew thin,
There were signs of trauma on his ravaged skin…
He lived in the shadows and avoided the news,
Holes appeared in his well-worn shoes.
He occupied the space between the living and the fully dead,
Occupied by the lonely struggle within his head…
Struggling forever with the how and the why,
One evening he went to the forest to die…
Struggling yet with what to believe,
To enter the forest, but to never leave…
Like a man crawling along a dangerous ledge,
In near darkness he came so close to the edge…
Unseen birds tweeted in the dim light.
Perhaps the time had come to relinquish the fight…
The rope hung heavy in his hand,
Yet it was something he could not yet understand.
He had planned for this but now he faced a wall,
And with his last free thought he made one last call…
In their headlights, he came into view.
Flashing lights and men in blue…
They found him on the mountain among the trees,
Crying gently on his knees…
The hospital was loud and filled with light,
Quite unlike the forest in the night.
He paced the ward, up and down, around, and around,
A blunted unsmiling face on display, as he unwound…
And there appeared the same burning rage and brooding unsmiling state…
Hard to engage, the anger and hate…
Awake all night and asleep all day,
So much to think about, so little to say…
He would hardly ever smile and would barely laugh…
Injections, appointments, and ever-changing staff.
He had written a book about his spirit land,
Difficult to read and hard to understand…
Where to fit in, how to belong?
He painted stark pictures, and he played his song…
He lived in a world with his untethered twin,
And he would return to the forest as darkness settled in.
His inner dialogue playing in his ears,
His resentments, his anger, his inner fears…
He followed stories of yowies and mythical creatures,
And was susceptible to the gospels of charlatan preachers…
At times his inner violence erupted in his outer world,
A tortured psyche in pain – unleashed and unfurled.
How to contain what spilled into view?
How to support or to know what to do?
To construct a way, to make plan…
He drove with me to where it began.
Something within me began to be unfurled,
As we entered his forest and walked in his world…
Amidst the vines, the lichen, and the ferns,
I loosened the grips of earthly concerns.
Something began to change in his face,
As again and again we returned to this place.
No longer so angry, so withdrawn or so hostile,
He softened, he talked, and on occasions would smile.
It came to me slowly and in degrees,
Walking again and again, amidst the buttressed supports of eternal trees…
Though it had seemed so hard to comprehend,
The forest was not my enemy, it was our friend.
Languid branches above, cool air below,
A path in the forest – so much to know…
Ageless trees growing to the sky,
You can speak to the dimness and the birds reply,
You can speak to the dimness and the birds reply…
Warwick Middleton, Copyright 08-01-23