Some evenings we’d find ourselves staggering down the steep embankment behind the second to last house on Franklin Street. Our stomping grounds which we roamed day & night for a decade plus. Tripping over the veiny tree roots that stuck out like traps. Thick, old veiny witch arms reaching out of the black soil, angry. Constantly scratching up our ankles as we thumped single file along the worn down tree line of ‘The Mystical Forest’ & in our hearts we’d always hear distant speed drumming as we all balanced, finding our individual ways over the cracked, leaking ply wood panels that were tossed on the thinnest part of our local ‘Bog of Eternal Stench’s’ black muck.

We’d lay our numb bodies on the crab grasses of ‘The Field’ while noise surrounded us. Safely cradled in the center of the world we’d gaze into the dusk filled sky & chuckle about the trees that spoke about us.

Trees that would watch us for the years to come, Trees that were always whispering screams about us.

Arguing & thinking about how our lives would end up.

& then I’d smile at you & say… “listen to the trees, please & don’t ever forget this moment.”