I am canopied and enveloped by trees, in a canyon that wraps and holds you. A fractal of nature in an otherwise barren cityscape. The stolen desert. The sky swims through shadings of indigo, pink and blue around me. I wait for the stars that wink at me and tell me secrets. I am neighbored by brilliantly magenta poinsettia flowers, bamboo and palm trees, and I am crying. I am crying because when I have a feeling, when I am hurting, or heartbroken, or brimming with fury, I am transmuted and soothed by nature. I can come outside and hand my feelings to the trees, with their outstretched leafy fingers, and soften. And they are unconditionally giving.The trees don’t care if you texted your ex you weren’t supposed to, or how much money you make, they just give and give and give and in private moments they seem to vibrate and sing at such an angelic pitch and pace, you swear you are with god.
Sometimes I will be resting on a tree and I’ll start wishing I could merge with it, wishing I could entwine my body with roots and skin with bark and hair with leaves, wishing I could just be an observer instead of playing part in the dramas and chaos of humans. Wanting to climb into the skin of the sea, to descend past and through all the creatures, right into the heart of the earth. There I want to expunge the toxins of the population that lives above.
Put down your phone. Reconvene with your own flesh, revisit the trauma that has made a home in your body and expunge it. Expunge it with the earth and with the fire of all the women who love too much.