Two Excerpts from Angelina Zeoli’s Nature Journal

July 22, 2020
You need to get low
even lower.
Be intimate with the ground, down
where the beginnings of all life sprouts, and
the end of all life resolves.

To observe this ground from an upright stance
would appear the same as if the entire forest was viewed
from an airplane:
a broad scene of the surface; but to
get down low
will reveal another forest within the primary.

Ferns fifteen inches tall
provide the canopy cover of the great red oaks and maple trees,
Small twigs represent their fallen logs,
Bustling bugs scurry about like squirrels.
The sizable outcrop of shale on which
this micro jungle proliferates
abruptly juts down like a cliff, halting
the woody wonderland.

This forest underneath the forest is visible
only to those with willing eyes and spirit, those
rapt enough to put their face
to the dirt, so to behold
a world unsung.

July 23, 2020
The longer you look,
the more you’ll see.
The closer you listen,
the more you’ll hear.
And as you allow time to pass
rampant in this state of mind,
the more you’ll come to be familiar
with the patterns of nature.
Thus, the simplicity of being
will manifest itself in you.