it happened on a dim brook, the water clear, rushing past mossy stones. shadows emerging through willow branches dipping toward my forehead.  laying back, chest and arms open, hands wet and open to chilly warmth, my body in bluejeans and a woolly sweater spread against and pressed into wet soil and discarded leaves

no shoes ever
throwing them anywhere every chance i get
always demand feeling life through my hands and palms and fingers and lips and soles
casting myself into solitude
laying there on the forest floor i felt bare / open / nearly free

immersed in the scents of loamy soil, pine needles, wild onion, hazelnuts, scratchy bark of orchard trees
sounds chirping chorus frogs, shouting moon, acres of wild wheat rushing nowhere with late night early morning breeze

this is when I discovered meaning and beauty and strength in myself
my will / will to be . to be none of them. to be all of my own.