From what I remember

19 October 2010 11:25 AM Categories: Animal/vegetable/mineral

Before the death of imagination, there was a house. Behind the house was a cornfield, behind the field, a road drained grey by sun. A forest grew on the other side, hemmed in by small housing developments. Dark patches slept here and there along the road, shadows created by reaching tree limbs. At a dip in the road opposite an ancient tulip tree, a path, crisscrossed by briars, led into the woods. Thirty yards in was a hole wide and deep enough to hold a grown man.

The sky was leaf and branch. Mayapples sprung out of a thick mulch of dead leaf and rotten wood. Beams of sunlight broke through to highlight a tree, a cave made of briars, a pile of animal scat. The path crumbled at each footstep, releasing the wet scent of autumn, the stillness of winter, the deceit of spring. A woodpecker harassed a poplar trunk while robins and chickadees chorused, their trills high-pitched and showy.

Imagination lived: this was a swimming hole; the place the village women took their washing; a natural bath fed by a stream. Spring rains overflowed it with water clean enough to drink. A walk with a plastic bag stuffed with fresh clothes and a sturdy towel, the brace of water that held the memory of ice, cloying red clay against bare skin. Damp, mineral-laden earth spiced the air, made it hard to breathe.

Closed eyes in dappled sunlight. Fluttering darkness. Toes pressed into mud. First he was a shadow, then a silent moment, finally, a heavy weight.

Trust only what you can see, what you can gnaw or scratch, the smell of right now.

Image by stevebkennedy

Tags: writing, walks in the woods, death of imagination, childhood

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