I have come to old haunting grounds,
where memories are alive in the trees,
shapes and curvatures of
Hickory, Oak, and Elm leaves,

relics of another reality.

How I went to you for comfort, then,
wore your pungence
on hair and skin,
ingested your creeks, winding in
among tree roots,
collecting in secret pools
where Water Striders and Minnows lived
in a constant state of flux,
where hair from dangling legs stood out
like crawdad feelers,
sifting river bottom silt,
seeking nutrience
in your flow of stillness.

You emptied my chaos
sending it tumbling down stream over stone
and over arrowhead into the forest
where it got lost in the rituals
of loving land.