It disarms me.
The stillness, the mud squelching between my toes and the
squashed aroma of sap, moss and decay transports me into the memory of another
day.
A blanket spread upon the ground, half in sunlight and half
shaded by the arms of an oak tree. Birds are singing distantly. High above they
are building their nests from the previous Autumn’s leftovers.
There is life and greenery. Children play amongst the
bluebells and daisies, dancing and singing with an infectious joy. Others make
collages from the different leaves they find: Ash and Poplar, Beech, Lime and
the ubiquitous Oak.
It is a festival of Spring and of nature; a celebration of
the continuing cycles of birth, growth and death. Where others pray to silent
and unseen Gods in grey and cold constructions, we sit in quiet reverence to
the warmth and coloured diversity of the Earth.
No-one who is here believes it could be destroyed.
I am back in the present; back in the bleak landscape of
man-made destruction. Where trees once stood are now black holes, lost to the
depths of time. All life that relied on them vanished with them. The
woodpeckers, the mushrooms, the beetles and the squirrels all evicted. Behind
me some of that life still remains, like the past, but ahead of me the world is
unrecognisable.
The clogging smell of diesel and brick dust fogs my senses,
like a thick curtain, as they prepare to try again. Today, like every other day
for the last six months, what remains is due to be ripped up and torn apart.
Our home.
They do not see us coming since they do not know we exist.
But today I give myself and add my name to the long list, to ensure the forest
lives another day.
