Old yellowed memories like spotty footage play in the private theater.
Palms ruddy, rough bark, scraped knees.
Precarious seating, perching in the sky.
the tree and i, woven fates, were a pair.
i swung from them, made my den, hiding in their canopy.
the sunsets, when together, were never more beautiful.
The pages turned to red hot resentment in the ribcage.
Damned mirrors, lumpy flesh, whispered words.
Jealousy running wild through the veins.
i wanted, nearly needed, to be them.
life would flash past, like a blink, to my woody eyes.
the peace, ingrained bark, could never compare.
Outside, drawn to the spot, soaking into the horizon.
Sliced up, headless, mushroom infested.
They are nothing but a dream in the ground.
if i had succeeded, tree transfiguration, i’d be here.
stumpy corpse, disintegrating, sparking envy.
our fates, throbbing pain, severed.
Yet still, legs carrying it all relentlessly forwards.
Cursed growth, new knotting, joy?
Precarious grounding, planting in the earth.
This week the theme was ‘Woods’. The story was inspired by my childhood experiences with my favorite tree in my backyard. I was quite the climber as a child, and it was a the favorite form of play that I had.
The second part of the story is inspired by my dysphoria, triggered by puberty, which particularly drew me to dreams and wishes to be something nonhuman. I was so out of connection with my own body, and disgusted by it, that I couldn’t think of any better alternative than to be something like a tree.