Today
I take my hunchbacked heart
for a walk
in cathedrals of trees.

And each step
off-road, off-grid, on dirt,
returns me
to an earlier me –
to a memory of milk teeth smiles
and always look up.

And with each step,
on this day
(I wish it always felt like this),
my thoughts
become more like dragonflies;
and my muscles
more like winter bees;
and slowly
the skin of my civilised self
hardens and sheds
– a cicada shell;
and suddenly,
from the outside,
I can see the useless husk it was –
so fragile and constrictive.

And as I keep walking
further into the forest
all my straight lines
begin to warp and twist like wattle branches;
and all my black-and-whites
are softened into shades of green;
and all my human grandness
shrivels and cowers
beneath a towering grove
of mountain ashes.

Fecund,
meandering,
I grow into my youth
like a tree
re-entering the seed.

I am simpled;
trimmed back
to a beautiful
potential.

I know,
in many ways,
this cannot last;
but
I also know
this moment is growing roots;
this moment is digging in deep;
this moment is going to
sprout words
and flower into poetry –
I can see
the lines, like leaves,
already forming:

Today
I take my hunchbacked heart
for a walk
in cathedrals of trees...