The paths I wander
beneath Appalachian foothills
wind along Brush Creek,
where limestone glimmers below the water’s skin,
and crayfish slip like secrets
under shelves of ancient shale.

I pause at the edge
where cardinal and goldfinch argue among sycamore crowns,
their songs threading through dawn’s sapphire hush,
while a chorus of frogs—spring’s viridescent musicians—
fill the low places with their tremulous praise.

I breathe the story of Berea:
air sweet with wild blackberries
and the distant cut of hay—
fields stitched with Queen Anne’s lace (or Hemlock – sometimes it is hard to tell the difference)
and the bruised colbalt of chicory,
each blade and blossom
shaping memory with gentle hands.

Here, the woods are thick with pawpaw,
hickory, sugar maple—
roots knotting deep as kin,
moss soft as the prayers
whispered on Nana’s porch
when storms pass through and lightning writes
its runes above the ridges.

How could any painted canyon,
any orchid’s impossible hunger,
awaken such quiet fullness
as these shadowed hollows,
these limestone fence lines
stitched by the invisible labor
of rain and time and roots?

Neglected memories come softly—
the rasp of gravel under bike tires,
laughter echoing down the railroad tracks,
the taste of creek water
drunk from cupped hands
on a day so hot
even the cows in the pasture
move only for shade.

Every inhale brings the wild spice
of goldenrod and sassafras,
the ancient patience of cedar,
the sharp verdant promise
of ferns unfolding among rocks.

This is the land that tempers me,
sorting what is sorrow
from what will be remembered—
a land that quiets old noise,
that softens the tangled ache of longing
like river stone turned smooth
in the palm of a returning child.

And always,
beneath it all,
the silent persistence of home:
spring water and hillside,
foxglove and field,
the low lazy mist that gathers
when evening calls
and woodsmoke threads
the valley’s hush.

Perhaps it is only a pause
to catch my breath,
but here,
in the soft light on the ridges,
I remember the joy that waits
in coming back—
and in the small, steady wildness
of staying.