Bark

I went into the woods as a man and came back as a tree. My arms are gnarly and twisting like a branch. My feet are root-like. My heart is bark. I stand facing the back of some houses and I whistle to them through the wind. On a good day, a kid runs by where I’m rooted in the woods. He asks me what it feels like to be a tree, and I tell him that it’s hard. That it feels more finite somehow than being a human, yet more grounded in life. Come nighttime, a barred owl perches on my topmost branch, which is part of my hair now. She caresses my ears with its hoot. In the distance, behind a fluff of underbrush, the silhouette of some foxes is imprinted against the black belly of the woods, and I like to think they are here for the owl, waiting for the right time to devour it whole. The hair on my neck shudders through my leaves. I hold hands with the neighboring tree. I think of Fern, how she ran into the woods one day and never returned. How she remains buried at my feet. How I can still feel her breathing.