Diane Mayr
Lost: 23 Million Acres of Farmland
Cow photo courtesy Library of Congress, Earth photo courtesy NASA/DMSP
Response
The Dimensions
By Heather Buckley
Inspiration piece
Behind my house, behind the sheep’s pasture, there is a forest. It starts with a steep hill that ends at the edge of a stream. On one side, the trees aren’t quite as tall or thick. There is a path that had been made and deemed a cattle road for a past business venture. The land has been beaten down by footsteps of humans and domesticated livestock. Then there is the stream itself. It normally freezes in the winter and starts to run again in the spring time. The water runs clear and cold. It never gets deeper than three feet. It sits in the middle of fifteen acres. The stream bisects the forest in half. As if it were separating two dimensions.
On the other side of the stream there is no dirt to hide the sounds of footsteps. Each step is a crunch or snaps from something that failed to thrive. The trees provide constant shading with few spots of dappled sun lighting the dead leaves that make up the ground. The trees grow taller, stronger, thicker, and closer together. There are spots where the sun, even at high noon, can’t shine through the leave; leaving those pieces in a permanent dusk.
Whenever I’m back there, I swear my mind starts to play tricks on me. I start to see things wander and weave between the towering trees. They move so quickly my mind starts to question this reality.
Sometimes I wish I could join them. Do nothing by spy on prying eyes that dared to cross the brook and into the wrong side.
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