Interior

There are similarities I notice: that the hills which the eyes make flat as a wall, welded together, open as I move to let me through; become endless as prairies; that the trees grow spindly, have their roots often in swamps; that this is a poor country; that a cliff is not known as rough except by hand, and is therefore inaccessible. Mostly that travel is not the easy going from point to point, a dotted line on a map, location plotted on a square surface but that I move surrounded by a tangle of branches, a net of air and alternate light and dark, at all times; that there are no destinations apart from this. There are differences of course: the lack of reliable charts; more important, the distraction of small details: your shoe among the brambles under the chair where it shouldn’t be; lucent white mushrooms and a paring knife on the kitchen table; a sentence crossing my path, sodden as a fallen log I’m sure I passed yesterday (have l been walking in circles again?) but mostly the danger: many have been here, but only some have returned safely. A compass is useless; also trying to take directions from the movements of the sun, which are erratic; and words here are as pointless as calling in a vacant wilderness. Whatever I do I must keep my head. I know it is easier for me to lose my way forever here, than in other landscapes Margaret Atwood "Journey to the Interior"

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Green Interior

2018