The calling

Forward

I lace my boots
as I should have done
long ago.

I borrow the long brown coat.
and slip out at dawn,
knowing it is imperative
no one knows.

They’d think I’d lost it.
They’d think…
I don’t care what they’d think.

I had to go, and I went.

I walked where the voice told me.
It didn’t say what to do —
only where to go.
So I went.

I came to an opening
in a forest.
As I reached it’s centre,
the winds stilled,
the whispers stopped,
the birds fell silent,
and the owl did not blink.

I looked around.
Only trees — old, tall pines.
I stood there, unsure
whether to move.

Then the sun’s first orange
broke through the trunks.
I began to walk toward the light,
and the only sound in that forest
was the breaking of branches
under my feet.

I reached another opening
and sat down in the middle.
I was lost — I knew.

When I tried to turn back
the way I came,
a deep resistance rose in me,
and my body would not obey.

All right, I said.
I’ll walk this way.
I don’t know why or what for —
but all right.
I see.

And I kept walking
toward the sun.

As the sun moved across the sky,
so I moved through the forest,
as I had promised.

For many days I walked like that.
For many nights I rested
with open eyes
in the light of the moon.

Even exhausted, I walked —
day in, day out.

One day I stopped
at yet another opening.
I sank to my knees,
faint from walking.

I let myself fall.
I let go.
I fell into a deep sleep —
a sleep once lost
and now found.

A night passed.
Then a day.
Then another night.

And the day I woke,
I stood up
and walked toward the sun.