Whispers Beneath the Deep Woods
On the edge of the deep woods, dusk pressed against the trees like a lid. I had come chasing a rumor, not a monster, but a rumor that the forest could turn sound into something heavier than air. The path curled inward and the air smelled of rain and pine, as if the world were closing its eyes. Every step seemed to measure a heartbeat that wasn’t mine, and the deeper I went, the more the green shadows leaned toward me, alive and listening.
Do you hear us, traveler? whispered the air, not through wind but through the knots of bark. "We remember every name spoken here, and every step that learns ours."
The whispers followed, winding around my wrists like cold vines. I told myself it was only weather, only the world choosing to murmur back. Yet the scent of damp earth grew louder, and the trees began to tilt slightly, as if nodding in approval at my trespass.
To survive this voice-work of the forest, I started noting the signs—the language the woods kept hidden in plain sight:
- Footprints that vanish when you blink, only to reappear in reverse a moment later.
- Branches that rearrange themselves to sketch a path that always returns to the same silent stump.
- A chorus of leaves that repeats your own name, but with a tremor that isn’t yours.
- The scent of rain on stone where the soil should have kept only scent and silence.
In time, the trees drew me toward a clearing I had not intended to reach. A ring of old stones held a breath of cold air, and at its center lay a shallow hollow that looked back at me with the darkness of a well. When I spoke my name aloud, the forest answered not with fear but with a measured, patient curiosity. The whispers did not threaten me so much as invite me to stay, to listen, to become a map for someone else who had wandered too long.
Echoes in the Clearing
Night pressed closer, and the woods opened their throat. I learned to listen for what the heart forgets: a hinge in memory, a pulse beneath the moss, a voice that carries your own fear back to you as a warning and a question. The forest does not end; it changes you. When I finally turned toward the edge of the trees to leave, the whispers asked for something simple—my permission to remember me, to hold a place for my name in the dark beneath the deep woods.
“We will keep your name,” they said, “as long as you are willing to listen.”
I walked out only when the forest released me with a final exhale, as if a door had closed behind me and left my footsteps to echo in its memory.