Every Day

EveryDay

 by Roya Sorooshian

maybe yesterday i was falling through a swamp of mud, but today i am walking (squelchsquelch) on the edge. there are trees with eyes that see too much, they try to grab at me when i walk by. 44 year old trees with moss like sideburns and roots that bulge like pot bellies. they surround me, i can't avoid them, their branches snag at my hair as my breath snags in my throat. they are trees i would never climb, old, rotten, twisted like poison. no matter where i go, how many corners i turn, i can never let my laughter invade this nightmarish swamp again. the hot, murky air that blows in no direction makes me nauseous, maybe that's what warped the trees. maybe it is my fault the branches have cracked. did i swing from them for so long they bent over with fatigue? did it wither when i carved my initials <and his> in the bark? is it my fault that these trees grow here, where the only travelers are young and confused? is that why i don't say anything, why i don't use the ax i carry? why i left teh swing that hung from their branches, to pick my way around the roots, trying so carefully to step around them? i am so afraid. what would happen if i slipped and fell? i would hit my head, lay there forever under teh shade of the tree, paling and paling till my eyes held no color. i am afraid that the tree will crack and fall, but i am more afraid of the noise if someone calls "timber!" the thought of what might happen makes my knees weak and my stomach turn. it pushes away any sunshine that might have penetrated this swamp; sunshine which would rather keep us in darkness and denial. i would rather not see, be blind to the things that lurk in the branches; be deaf to the rustling of the leaves. but i walk through this swamp of sickness and malformed trees. and i am afraid (of) EveryDay.