Coppice Creeks

I picture this long stretch of grass going straight off into the distance, its end brought up by the dying flame and broil of the waning sun on the horizon. On the stretch’s sides are coppices in neat lines following the grass path. Big clumps of dead, sweet-grass bite the tongue and crumble at the touch; defective, fused young poplars and stunts of pine and oak choke each other’s throats as they struggle to taste the remnants of the broiling heat upon their hearts before the familiar pang of loneliness sets in.

The air is warm with dissipating heat. The final, sleepy breeze rustles the grass path, signaling the beginning of the night with the rustle of the stalks, alive and juicy with life and heat and flavor. Dark now - can’t see my hands. A chorus of crickets (or was it grasshoppers?) Travel in a monotonous caravan through the grass, the stalks kneeling as they pass by.

The moon is up now,  fat and dripping with stars the color of sweat and birth. Clouds loll about procrastinating in the night sky, too far up for me to hear their shrieks as they are disemboweled by shooting stars tearing through their misty forms. I’m not sure what I’m doing here in this place, but I hear something - like thunder, though sweeter and much more tame - up ahead, down the stretch.

I set off. My sneakers crunch the cricket’s (or was it grasshoppers?) song into dust and weird green slime; the grass falls silent once more. My jeans ride up in my ass, and I pull them down with an unconscious tug, senses focused on the tame thunder I hear up ahead. My jacket oppresses me; the grass suffocates under its pressing, cobalt form.

I’m running now, T-shirt growing warm and sultry as a thin coat of sweat arises on my flesh. Blood throbs in my ears ‘cause my hearts beating that damn hard. Wild brown hair bounces with each step as the thunder up ahead grows louder and more tame. The deformed coppices stretch out their gnarled claws toward me, pleading eyes a spiral of iridescent hues and oblong shapes as I pass by, tasting dust and earth in my mouth and on my tongue. I stumble forward and see the thunder, the tame savage:

A creek.

Clear, warm water bubbles and pops over the curvatures of smooth pebbles and shale as it winds away from the mountains to my left to the forests beyond. Honeysuckle laps at its surface, bouncing back in a hypnotic dance of molten yellow and spray of crystal liquid against the inky backdrop of the slumbering world. Moss and lichen crust the larger slabs of rock that dot the sandy bank of the creek, as well. The beating of my heart and the blood therein cools, stills, as I listen to the creek’s incessant gibberish filling a part of the empty silence that permeates around me. I take off my sneakers and socks and sit in the warm sand, placing them beside me as I let the warm, light water flow over my pale feet and long toenails that desperately need clipping.

The world is so still now, in this forgotten place; a sanctuary, you might call it. I’m happy here, at peace here, in love here. I have no desire to think, do, or act - I am numb with happiness. And as it envelops and paralyzes me, it’ll do to you if you can find your own strip of grass; row of coppice; tame savage, soft thunder.

A coppice hideaway…

A coppice creek.