I went to the woods because
I wished to live deliberately,
to front only the essential facts of life,
and to see if I could not learn
what it had to teach,
and not, when I came to die,
discover that I had not lived.
I wanted to live deep
and suck all the marrow of life.
~ Henry David Thoreau
WOODS
I wish to grow dumber,
to slip deep into woods that grow blinder
with each step I take,
until the fingers let go of their numbers
and the hands are finally ignorant as paws.
Unable to count the petals,
I will not know who loves me,
who loves me not.
Nothing to remember,
nothing to forgive,
I will stumble into the juice of the berry, the shag of bark,
I will be dense and happy as fur.
— Noelle Oxenhandler
Poetry Garden
