In the Womb of the Forest

A Poem Gifted by an Enchanted Forest

Joe and I, along with a few friends, visited a small island called Decatur in the San Juan archipelago. While hiking through a place known as the Enchanted Mossy Forest, a friend paused beside a tree stump and pointed out an unusual pattern. Several patches of bark had grown together over the top of the cut, forming a gentle dome—almost as if the stump were being embraced.

Our friend said softly,
“This tree suffered a trauma. But it’s still deeply connected to the others through the underground mycelial network. So the surrounding trees sent it energy, helping it grow bark to cover the wound. This is the wisdom of the forest as a whole being—it tends to its own, shielding the wounded and protecting the forest from further harm.”

Tears welled up in my eyes. In that stump, I saw the girl inside of me—the one who has carried the imprint of collective trauma since the age of ten, frozen in a place too deep for words.

And yet, like the forest, I had not been alone. I had been held and nourished by the unseen care of my family and ancestral lineage. Even though my parents never fully understood the nature of my work, even though no one in my family could speak the language of healing or articulate the big picture, I’ve been protected by their blessings, their presence, their quiet love.

After visiting the stump, Joe and I sat down in the soft, moss-covered forest floor. Together, we wrote this poem.

In the Womb of the Forest

A stump carrying scars,
its bones carved with forgotten stories,
wrapped in a hush of moss-green breath—
unwept tears, unheard cries,
held in its weathered silence.

Still rooted though severed,
it listens to the mycelium’s hum.
From nearby trunks, quiet love flows—
sap shared across unseen veins,
a slow stitching of bark over wound.

The girl inside remembers.
Frozen at ten,
she curled inward like a fern at dusk.
Yet even then,
the forest never turned away.
It whispered her name through the roots,
sent care in shadow and shelter.

In the womb of the forest,
a dream planted by shooting stars
takes root in the ache of sleeping pain.
Ancestors stir beneath her skin—
a longing so deep,
it echoes in the hollow rings of time.

She is not alone.
Every scar speaks in wooden grain.
Every silence is a song unfinished.
And in the soft, green hush,
a cradle forms around the wound.

Not healed, but held.
Not whole, but heard.
Always becoming
beneath the canopy of care.