Old growth forests contain a magic alchemy
that connects one to the source, the origin, the Big Bang.
The star dust we are composed of seeks a home which
cannot be found in the broken and
attempting to heal
landscapes mowed into miniscule patches
like a flesh wound on the surface of a human terrace,
trying to heal by crossing a massive valley we usually suture with thread.
Most of nature we see has been split
into tiny fragments,
sometimes sutured together into wilderness
corridors
once man has exploited their easy to reach elevations.
The dust that ties us to
the fungus, the insects, bacteria, protozoa,
is infinitesimally small, and as such,
those massive inert valleys we created
cutting ancestors to their ankles with our metal machinery,
combusting dinosaurs and
releasing plague after plague of hooved locusts are
too large for the building blocks
which used to be like ever-extending hands on a clock,
the longer we left them the more clear our
place in time became,
now must be given tremendous time to
find all of the perfect polarities to
piece back together all of
their pre-historic partnerships.
Believe me,
it will happen.
But we humans may not see that glory.
We have perhaps 5% of the old growth forest still in existence in California.
But like a single tree,
the more we cut away,
the less resilient the rest of the forest becomes.
Inversely,
the more time we spend in old growth forests,
the more resilient we become.
The dust I am made of knows its home.
I walk into the ancient redwood forest and
they welcome me to my origin in a way
only the stars and the ocean can.
Like a soldier home from war,
the leaves cheer me on as I walk deeper.
I take my shoes off and
the soil life pushes me up and
opens a valve in the bottom of my feet
to release
my murky waters within like
the original oil change.
I slurp up the terpenes
from their outbreath and
as they pour down my nose and throat
they loosen my jaw,
my ears unclog,
my shoulders droop as if
I'm being covered by a warm blanket on the inside.
I find my spot between two enormous red columns,
pointed up to the stars,
so tall they look to be two lovers touching noses.
They speak to the stars and the seas,
bringing water inland and life to the ends
of streams.
I lay myself down between.
I rest where the stars meet the seas
at the feet of nature's tallest conductors
falling back into a million years of soil and
turning the satellites
on the sides of my head
to enjoy
the concerto of origin.
