forest I am a forest of silence, full of thoughts I don't speak aloud, of feelings left to grow as wild as the unbidden trees; few people wander here-they hear the quiet but not everything living beneath it; the roots that hold me together, the small things still trying to bloom; I used to think silence meant emptiness, but now, I know it can also mean survival, a place to heal slowly, away from the noise of the world; and even on my most subdued days, something in me keeps growing, reaching towards the light.