A child again
I cannot find the classroom
heart pounding
looking for the exit sign
running taunted from the recess line
in neural-stormed confusion.
I stand-alone again
while rain beats down
on monkey bars.

I never could perceive
the path to interweave
it might be nice
to have a friend I said
while walking to the trees
through salmon-berried nettles
to the massive trunks
of bark-clad guardians
dressed in moistured lichen
north and south.

The briars shook my hand
the Devil beat me with a club
and underbrush embraced me
with her formic acid sting
and fungi whispered windy truths
to guide me to a place of refuge
water all around me trickled
into stony paths where rivers
birthed themselves from
earth-wombed cracks and craigs

The one child left behind
sat eagerly before
the mossy teacher’s desk
and held the lessons of the earth
in bitter-mouthed suspension
and the spirit-animals began to speak
their softly structured wisdom
and the heart began to stir
until its root-seed anchored
deep relief in shimmered
spider webs of destiny.

Robert J.Foss
https://allpoetry.com/Betoangel