Alone
Story:
I strain my eyes to locate the exception.
Too many layers of life and evolution in differing hues of greens and
browns, and sounds too, muffled by the devouring. The very dark I see, has yet
to be found by its company. I must focus or loose equilibrium and to loose equilibrium is to be found.
There are no breaking twigs to warn you in this Garden of
Eden, there is just calm.
Standing in the middle of a rain forest, silence deafening.
Musty, damp, creepy, wet, filling your senses with the same dread that
visits when you’re lost in a ghetto.
Do you call out or whistle as you walk home or silently suck through the air? This
rain forest saunas heat and watches as you drink the air. Green and brown
life under your feet is moving. The spongy decay will not make a sound if
you fall and fail to rise. See the high canopy and silhouettes of trees
standing in the mist, creatures know you are there.
You will only hear their breathing once, and you have lost. Small
birds darting from moss laden tree to moss laden tree without sound are
mocking me. Their flight is silenced
by this stage and they know it. They
use it to confuse the intruder into thinking there are more of them; similar to
darting from one spot to the next and calling out at each location to give the
impression you are surrounded, when in fact there are only three in the game. Quickly they dart
about, black rips in the fabric of the canopy.
Sometimes their tongues tickle my ears with their one syllable warnings. The
deafening moisture passing over their wings aids their exaggerated slow motion
flight. They mock one another, and
tease the intruder. They refuse to join me yet curiously chirp from a hundred
feet to let me know I am not alone. They have no fear.
Droplets are falling from leaf to leaf reflecting ever changing minute
images of life as they race to the ground.
The sweet smell of decay comes from a ground littered with natures dead and the
symbiotic relationships of those alive.
Suddenly the cold is here, and I can hear fallen limbs being broken as
something heavy comes! The night is coming and my chirping friends have
become me. We know something is coming, I can feel it…will whistling
as I walk, work this time?
To be continued… RJ