To Breathe A Tree

I sat against the trunk of the ages old tree and closed my eyes.  I was tired of walking in this forest of melody and mist, I needed a rest, I needed food, I needed to be dry and to find a real bed, a fireplace and a few moments of peace.  I only closed my eyes for a moment, thinking to myself, ‘only for a few seconds, sweet tree, keep me company’.

Slowly the sounds of the forest slid away from my consciousness.  The songs of the birds became softer and then were gone. The frogs, crickets and other noises from the underbrush slowed, quieted, and were gone.  My hands reached into the mossy warmth around me, and I could feel the energy swirling within my mind.  I could hear my own breath for a long while, and it was warm in the sun, there against my tree, and then I slept.

I must have been asleep, because the dream was fantastical.  The tree took a breath, and I could feel it inhale, from the roots, to the topmost leaves, it drew in a great breath and seems to shiver against me for a timeless moment. I relaxed against the smooth bark and moss, the tree seemed to hug up tight against me and we simply breathed for a while.  In my dream I could sense the tree exhale, a slow, humming breath that started from the leaves and went to the roots and back again. It was deep and spiritual in ways I can not begin to explain to you now.

The tree and I shared a dreamtime, intertwined in hearth and spirit, breathing as one with all of creation.  I was connected to all trees in the forest.  I could smell with every leaf, I could drink and eat with each root, because all of the trees were touching in ways I had never known before.  Many of the trees had other plants growing within the foliage and on the bark, and those plants and I became one as well.  Flowers and shrubs, blowing lazy in the sunny wind were alive with wonder and joy, they were singing to me.  The grasses between the trees beckoned to me and I moved into them as well, but I never left the trees, the flowers or the shrubs, I just became larger and my consciounsess expanded.

I looked up from a tree and saw a raven on the wind.  The raven looked into the sky and saw me there, and then I was aflight with her in the blue skies.  We soared into the wispy clouds and called out to the rest of creation.  We dove into a treetop and landed with a lightness upon a twig.  As her feet cluctched the twig I felt it from the tree’s point of view, and her’s as well.  There was shelter, warth, trust and admiration there.  The tree wasn’t just another tree to land upon; but was the raven landing upon the raven in a way I could have never known before that moment.

My attention spread out now and I was the fox in the tall grasses. I was the catepillar on the rose petal, I was the tree, the flower, the grass and then, then I was the wind itself.

I looked into the sky and simply became spirit, no longer needing the creature or plant or anything to be my vessel, I just was.  I moved over the forest and across the river, up the slopes of the moutatains, and they all welcomed me, they smiled and waved, they cried and laughed, they were me and I was them.

I moved higher still, into the cold darkess of the starlit empty space above the planted below.  When I woke, I was laying beside my fireplace upon a soft green blanket.