As the Life of a Tree

“I know we’re over,” she said, her head hanging limp like a dying flower.

Thirteen did not even have tears to cry.  Her head felt full and fiery, like some great flame had taken over her soul and burned her up like one of those hollow trees that became chimneys in the recent forest fires of the drought-ridden eastern mountain range.  Those trees had long-since been dead, hollowed-out by animals and bugs, leaving but a shell of a former life.  Who knows what originally killed those trees, whether droughts or some terrible pest or disease; but the flames that surged up and out of cracks and holes in the surface were certainly not culprit.

Had she the awareness of herself, in this moment, to see herself instead of feeling everything so deeply, she would have understood why she only felt the stinging pain of this latest fight.  She would have remembered the ages-old insidious thoughts and notions accepted that scraped and clawed at her, that hollowed her out; Thirteen had lovingly and ignorantly volunteered long ago to be emptied out and made a shell of herself in search of freedom and eternal love.  

For now, she only felt that emptiness filled with the heat of his and her intermingled, passionate anger, countless infractions piled upon one another until one or the other of them lit this… … or was it that they lit this fire together, their last act of unity?

Her mind stung in this sudden awareness: it was a joint-effort insurgence against each other that started this last feud.

She wanted to cry, to beg his forgiveness, to scream out in pain and terror at her realization; but she knew it would not make a difference; it would be like trying to spill a bucket’s worth of water on this very forest-like fire.

Thirteen shuddered and drank the knowledge herself, quenching that stream of fire within her.

Her eyes lifted to look upon him again.

He was as beautiful as she had ever found him to be, even in his rage.  Perhaps he was beautiful particularly because of his rage:  that raw emotion engulfed him differently than  her, flooded him and spilled from his every pore; and he only looked more like himself, very naturally. 

At least he is feeling deeply, she thought, gently; at least he is aware, fully.

It was only now that her eyes filled with tears, as if the flood of his emotion had finally reached her and was lapping at her most present orifice.

As she watched him, she felt herself flood with a love that felt heavy — as heavy as water, as heavy as a river streaming through her, and just as fluid.  Her head felt dizzy; she felt like she was rocking, swaying….

A question bobbed into her mind like a bottle drifting upon the waves of the ocean:  What am I to do?

The answer lifted into her mind through the flood of emotion as a bubble of air lifts through the water and bursts at the surface.  Thirteen understood suddenly that she had not been paying any attention to herself and the emptiness she had housed for so many years.  It was easy to be filled up by him:  by his emotions, needs, desires; by his beauty; by all of her responses, wishes and dreams related to him.  It was easy for her to feel so much for him when she had felt so very empty for so long; it was easy for her to be a home for others before and for him precisely because she was as empty as a hollowed tree that becomes home to squirrels, birds, insects, bees, foxes, snakes….

Of course they would make of her what they willed.  Of course they would be frustrated if she didn’t respond as they wished she would.  Of course they would go away.

It wasn’t his fault, nor any other’s, that she was hollow; but, what if she let herself be broken, finally, by this wave of passion, by this flood of emotion?  What if she let herself be destroyed entirely, ultimately, to become part of the earth again, part of everything she knew and loved, part of things she never knew?  What if she finally died to all she ever was and became something entirely new?

Her eyes cleared, and she felt something strange and indistinct in her mind.

She walked to him, bent slightly as she lifted his hand to her lips and kissed his knuckles meaningfully.  He watched, silently, with disturbed curiosity.

She raised to her full height once again and whispered, the sound barely a breath, the last that her heart knew.

Then Thirteen turned and walked away.

Photo ©2017 MLM