In The Woods To Home

I have felt so lost lately
like those two children in that old fable
circling around to places once familiar
to find that the landscape has changed
and the costumes and masks once worn
no longer fit.

The world around us changes so fast
and the world within has a hard time keeping up.
I want to find a place that doesn’t change,
some place that is always the same,
some place that no matter what happens to me or
in the world around me,
I can be.
Such a place is called home.

Even the word resonates deep within.
It strikes a chord of such longing
that it never ends.

I used to know these trees.
I used to climb them,
spend hours in the comfort of their bark-covered arms,
but now they have been cut down,
eaten by moth or beetle,
and the new small ones growing up to take their place
I don’t know.
They are too young for me to understand.

I fear what these woods are becoming
and who I am when I am in them.
I wonder if they will ever end.
The trees seem to go on forever.

I ask myself why I am on this path.
Why did I even start on it in the first place?
Who gave me directions?
Why has it gotten so dark so fast?
It seems like I am moving in circles not going anywhere
and yet nothing is familiar.
How can this be?

I have tried to live my life the best I know how.
I have tried to find something deep down inside to guide me,
but I can’t do it anymore.
I am so tired,
I am so tired of wandering,
I am so tired of wandering alone.

Have I actually let others into my life?
I look back over the journey and it seems
that I have always been alone.
I have filled my life up with more people
and I feel more alone.
The more I come to the city
the lonelier I become.

I can’t seem to bring myself to be with me.
There is no Gretel here.
It’s just me.
It has always been me.
It will always be me.

I can’t go back to the witch
and her gingerbread house,
so sugary and sweet.
I can’t keep throwing my bread down for the birds to eat.

I just have to keep plodding away,
hoping I find some way out of these woods,
some path to a place called
home.

(from Car Musings 8.2.98)

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