Woodland Creatures

"The smell of the wet earth in the rain rises like a great chant of praise from the voiceless multitude of the insignificant." ~ Tagore

When you walk, are you lost in thought?

Or are you aware of the creatures - mystical and mundane - quietly watching you?

They appear silent, yet teeming with life.

Do you sense them by the rising of the downy hair on your neck?

The tiny spider drifting upon a single thread...

Wait. Did you see a movement?

If you look too closely, they stop, but gaze upon something else, soften, and then, from the corner of your eye ...

Woodland creatures, sprites and all

who dwell among the leaves that fall,

those who shelter in the trees

or float upon the scented breeze,

need not hide behind a wall.

Theirs is such a life that we

cannot behold them, cannot see

mysteries, illusion's eye,

and so we often pass them by

unaware. They live on -- free.