Hut at the Edge of the Forest

For the (fictional) series, "Edges".
His Voice 


Hut at the Edge of the Forest

To haul myself along this river –

hauling the oars repeatedly

over and over, bending and straightening,

pulling from the shoulders –

is more obligation than pleasure,

more a habit of falling into rhythm,

the body accustomed, than a welcome

dance of arms and boat and water.

But it serves. Forthwith I am there.

My spirits always brighten on arrival –

just as if you would greet me ... as if 

you'd still be there waiting, coming to meet....

This poor, bare shack isn't home. Not now.

Home is the ocean and the lonely shore.

But this is a shelter sometimes required.

I can live with that necessity.

Besides, they are short winters here,

even though stormy. I can be under a roof

for a few weeks; I can tolerate walls.

As for your ghostly presence ...

The flaw in this argument is that you

are no ghost at all, not in the real sense.

Yet you ghost in my head as though 

you were dead. You might as well be.

I'm as forlorn without you either way:

uncomforted at night, dreading morning.

Still I go about my business. I am efficient

in the practicalities of this existence.

And for sure, there are pleasurable moments,

if not as before – the small moments

involving creatures of land or sea,

or sky, which holds the whole together.

In the gauzy wing of a dragonfly

or the light filtering slowly, in stripes

and irregular patches, down through

the tall trees of the rainforest,

in the rustling of insects in the dry leaves

underfoot, the calls of currawongs

flying over unseen, or the caw of a crow ...

sometimes I can find peace.

It's a gorgeous world still. I try

to live in it as if it were not also sordid,

tainted, wrong. In this corner where so few

intrude, I can keep some illusion.

Linked to Poets United's Poetry Pantry #405