Lament of the Forest

The forest is but a picture, framed by light, A tapestry of green, the earth’s domain, In every bough that stretches toward the heights, A silence sleeps—the echoes of my pain.

The whispers of the wind, they tell my woe, As every fallen leaf drifts from my grasp, The sorrow of the trees that bend and bow, For in their ancient hearts, our dreams will clasp.

Once mingled with the roots the teeming lives, Now lost, like sparks, to nevermore return, The sorrow of the woods will e’er survive, For beauty lost is beauty that will burn.

Yet here in quietude, my spirit weeps, And bears the weight of all that life forsakes, For in this solemn wood where time still creeps, The forest’s heart is where my thirst awakes.

• Constance Fennell