Love Letter to the Forest

Stretching my creative wings, I took a couple writing workshops in Findhorn, Scotland, led by dear friend and author, Orla Broderick. She led us through exercises to develop our favourite locations. In our short time of free flow writing, where we write and write without stopping and without correction, this came out. What’s below is left mostly untouched in its deliciously raw state...

I scramble up the rocks, which tumbled down the hill, who knows how long ago. My bare feet, familiar with the rough and jagged stones, finding easily the path and stairway leading up, further into the hill and the forest upon it. Water trickles over the dark gray stones, and the damp is held, captured by the green, brown, orange and blue mosses and lichens that grow there. Up and up, climb and climb, over the dark gray stones and greens. It’s been raining for days.

As I reach the level ground, and stand at the doorway, my feet sink and squish, ankle deep, into the thick soft moss beneath. I stand here a while. Breathing in the breath of the forest. Pine needles carpet the floor, and wafts of evergreen drift in the air from ages past. The thin, rich soil that allows the moss and tall trees to grow, releases its thick, musty, earthy scent. The birch trees wrap me in their enlivening wintergreen.

As I stand, staring through the doorway, feet held within the gentle moss, the sun descends amongst the bows of the evergreen and deciduous beings. Softly falling, softly moving, the light. I lift my foot, then the other, from the gentle bed beneath. I step to one bright green mound, to another. Crossing the doorway. Passing gnarled, old bark, touching it, an acknowledgement as I go by.

A space opens, emerges amongst the trees. A swell of granite - pink and gray in the sun. The warmth of the afternoon orb radiates from below. Here, a seat waits for me as it always does and always will. I stand beside it, drinking in the forest, the light. A gift has been left, a bright white antler, sharp points angling towards the sky.

Ease into my seat of stone, which fits just right. I watch the scene. I am the scene. Ants begin to crawl over my legs. Mosquitos come to feast. Damselflies and dragonflies drawn to eat, land to mate, dance, crackling in the sun. Their glistening, wide eyes meet mine, and I lose myself in their netted wings, and ever pulsing tales. Their lightly barbed feet attached, anchored to my skin.

Another tree has fallen, roots exposed. Pink lady slippers bob in the subtle breeze. Chipmunks and squirrels chatter from perches. This is their territory.

Georgian Bay Forest