Fugue (The Forest)

Mired in cold comfort in my car,
a coat for blanket, a headrest my pillow.
Hidden in the watching wood
in the roaring dark of winter.
Betrayed by the track that led to clinging ooze.

The radio murmurs at midnight of African politics,
of sporting triumph and economic malaise.
I listen intently and immediately forget what I have heard.
I am here to forget, just as the trees that bend and sway
and hiss their contempt as they crowd over me
to listen to the low words
do not deign to remember, not needing memory.

To have no need of memory would bring freedom
from my greatest enemy. A foe I fight with two-edged sword,
and hold at bay as long as each chill gulp of alcohol sustains me.
Bottles and cans are the ammunition that I must hurl at myself to win
a numbed respite, swelling with each shuddering swallow.

Were I numb enough I could step into the storm,
a sodden Captain Oates, leaving no-one in the tent
except the muttering voice that beguiles and detains me,
with its undemanding, unseeing companionship,
quietly helping me forget a far away frantic family.

Did I come here to walk into the lightless forest and sleep
until I sank beneath the ground, bracken thrusting through
my bones? I cannot remember now. For even without stepping
into the wailing wind and the heartless embrace of the trees
I am ceasing to exist, drowning willingly in the flow of words
that fills my frigid glass and metal chamber.

Am I a seed that must die before rebirth, or a rotten fruit,
fallen out of season? I know and care, here in this solitary present,
no more than any fruit or seed. Perhaps my sin is not confessing
that life can come from both. I cannot tell. My thoughts are slower now
than the clouds that race, weeping, to hide the Moon and stars.