Reflection Down by the River

I always feel more alive
when running in the forest.
It helps me
to think; it helps me not to think.

Jogging down by the river, through the forest,
is the most refreshing
-ly beautiful place.
Down the crumbling path, off the path—
each step an invasion—
if not for the parting of the foliage upon my arrival.
I regard the cedar discards on the forest floor,
a welcome mat of sweet smelling decay,
an invitation to run amongst the armoured soldiers of trees.
My eyes thirst to take in as much of this
scenery
as possible.
Every inch of the woods is probed by my vision.
I yearn to have the ability
to take a photo with my eyesight,
and keep the beauty with me.

Who knows when it will be the last time
I will see the glory of the forest?
Just as how darkness is a nothingness that yields so much more,
the woods hold a danger that I have yet to encounter.
The river I love
has held women’s bodies,
living, swimming
and floating, bloating…and dead.
The abstract fractals of the branching trees
have been witness to darker things
than the night…

…yet warnings have not kept me away.

Because even when I lay drowning
in a pool of my own blood,
as I intake breath into my gurgling lungs,
it will somehow be beautiful
and even then, I will be more alive

because I will be dying in the forest.