An Ode to a Forest
I IMAGINE WHAT IT WOULD BE LIKE TO BE THE EARTH. I FEEL THE MACHINERY DIGGING INTO HER INSIDES
Art by Tara Teslow
10/29/22
Early morning frost glistens on beech leaves as I head out onto trail. I’m hiking alone for the first time in a while, and it’s freeing not to have teenage boys on my heels and a heavy pack on my shoulders. My pace quickens as I move, ankles wobbly from a past injury and breath getting faster as I push my body harder. I don’t intend to be caught up to today.
I walk deeper into the forest, passing many familiar faces. Hobblebush, princess pine, bunchberry, and spruce who I am happy to greet. Sometimes, going into the forest feels more like going home than going home. I cross over water bars and other drainages, hearing the laughter of trail crews and the buzz of a chainsaw across timelines. I skip from stone to mossy stone like a child playing hopscotch in the rain. Sometimes I just stop and listen. Wondering, if I listen hard enough, could I hear the mycelium of the fungi passing notes among the trees?
My footsteps continue to make the swish-swish sound of feet against leaves. If I dragged my feet enough I bet I could make a pretty epic leaf pile by the end of this hike. Every so often one foot slides, or I trip over a leaf-covered rock or root. I give thanks for strong ankles. I hear my father saying, “Pick up your feet, Jordan.” I continue to press into a rhythm as I walk. I meander over streams and across a quilt of colors. The land becomes green in the fractals of ferns and dancing of club moss but then changes to the deep reds, grays, and browns of deer droppings and maples. Suddenly it shifts to a mossy log absolutely caked in dark feathers. I wonder what happened.
Every so often a “oh-la-la-la, oh-la-la-la, oh-la-laaaa dance away, ‘cause a Johnson’s coming” pops into my head, a song that isn’t supposed to be a joke but sort of became one after a concert I saw earlier this week. But I did have a dream about my ex-boyfriend last night, so maybe that’s where my brain is today.
I texted my friend the other day that, sometimes, I wish to know the Earth so intimately that I want to be her. My friend responded with: “JORDAN you need to sit down and write.” I think about this now, as I walk. I imagine what it would be like to be the Earth. I feel the machinery digging into her insides. Her disembowelment for oil and diamonds and the foundation of apartments. It reminds me of my father dressing a deer in the backyard. Dead black eyes and blue and red entrails like jewels sitting in the driveway. Maybe I don’t want to be the Earth.
Time is up and I turn around. My shadows pass trees and spiderwebs and polypore mushrooms as big as my head. Soil heaved up by water crystals add additional crunch to places the leaves haven’t claimed. I so deeply want to travel quietly through the forest but it’s difficult. Every rustle of a squirrel sounds like a bear so I definitely sound like an elephant. I accidentally flush a grouse out of the bushes. I exit the mouth of the forest and think about the quote, “The forest eats itself and lives forever.” I need more time to think