Forest Glade

She walks, head down, toward the aching forest,
Green leaves reaching her with their sweaty palms and dripping fronds;
She crumples mud crumbs with the bulbs on her toe bottoms,
Each itching and heaving their way into the damp blackened earth;

The wildflowers are blooming today:
Red, yellow, purple, and shades of white
Bristles that blow left and right through the current and occasional wind,
Her skirt rides up and waves to her knees:
Knobbly and cobbled with red welts from mosquitoes.

The frogs chant their peeping, bleeping, singing,
The pond is deep, the lilies green, the roots deep and sucking,
Deep and sucking down...
Down,
Into the center of the earth,
Where her soul is,
Pink and throbbing.