INTO THE SHADOW OF THE WOODS

We saw it as we passed and declared it the most beautiful place on earth. It seemed to hold a promise that later, lured us back. Like sleep walkers we returned, feeling that to this place we had always belonged. It was June, a beautiful summer day in June, when we walked into shadow of the woods. It seemed to have been waiting for me, that small living thing. It is difficult not to think so. It seemed to have been waiting for me, perched on a leaf or perhaps crawling on a bit of grass. Invisible, in all that emerald green. I never felt it or heard it, and I only saw it much later, when it was already too late. It made its way into my skin conquering all kinds of obstacles: shoes and shoelaces, socks, the many creases in my trousers. Just then, my life as I knew it ceased to be what it was, transformed into something else. Innocence seeped out of my veins. And later pain, relentless, began to travel up and down my limbs and beyond. That small living thing, the darkness that spilt from its guts, got to stay. It is still here. It does not want to leave, but I am fighting it.

by Carmen Alfonso   from her book of poems    'On the island of my bed: Living with Lyme Disease'

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