Paradise in the Forest
By Jessica Cambrook
Copyright Jessica Cambrook 2012
Cover Photograph: Steve H
Birth
The weak spring sun warms my patch of tree. It is an unfamiliar feeling after a gruelling winter. My tree has been naked and exposed to the rain and snow for months and I can feel its damp, mouldy bark pining for some heat. Beams of sunshine penetrate deep enough into my tree to reach even me, hibernating in its veins. The warmth awakens me from my deep slumber.
The branch I live in quivers in the gentle breeze. I stay within the darkness for now, sapping energy from my tree and storing it so I can root my way through the tree’s thick skin when the time is right. I am determined but weakened from stillness and cold. For almost half a year I have been living but not alive, since those before me wilted and were taken in autumn to Paradise. I hear whispers that tell me of the lucky ones, carried down the eternal path of Paradise after their duties have been fulfilled.
It takes a few weeks of storing before I finally begin to push outwards. Worming my way stubbornly through the unyielding layers of wood, I feel powerful. This is my test, I need to show I am deserving of life. I need to go to Paradise, where instead of silence and darkness there is light and birdsong. What is life if I have nothing to live for? If I survive this, I need something to die for. Life is too much of a struggle for there to be nothing in the After. If I can be one of the thousands who thrive, out of millions of us that try but do not make it past the barriers the tree has made to weed out the weakest, then I know I am deserving.
Then I reach sap, and I am bathed in syrupy glory. The whisperers told me the sap would be the indication that I am doing well. I am nearly there.
I can sense the change now that I am millimetres away. So much bustling and buzzing and vibrations bounce against my branch. But I am tired. The sap pulls me back, its heavy stickiness lost its refreshment a long time ago and now I hate it with all of my being. Except I am still not anything yet. I must push forwards or die. The tree, so old and wise and tricky, knows our limits and tests them thoroughly. It wants us to earn Paradise. A thrill shoots through me. Paradise awaits.
Life
With one final effort, I break through my tree’s cracked outer layer and feel the wind brush the exhaustion from me. My tree knows I have succeeded and renewed energy ripples through me from the veins of my branch. A reward. Not quite Paradise, but to have the vitality to appreciate my new world is a blessing. For the first time, I see my tree. It is beautiful. Majestically, it stands tall and wide, opening its branches to the world in a peace offering. It was born from Mother Nature and grown by her tender hands. In return, the tree produces us to keep the world and it alive. I will be important.
After such a struggle to surface, it is almost boring trying to wait to grow. I cannot aid the growth with my determination or strength; this is a matter of patience. To distract me, my tree tells me beautiful stories from ancient times gone by and I feel warm. I notice the world around me, the scenery and the creatures. Sunsets are my favourite, they fill the world with ferociously vivid colours and I feel I must be swept up in the most glorious dream imaginable, for surely I am not worthy of such splendour. The world is spoiling me, and I long for growth so I can fulfil my duties and repay my tree for allowing me to be.
Sometimes the birds land on my branch. They are enormous, a hundred times bigger than the miniature sun. Always I was told of the sun’s enormity but it seems to be even smaller than I. The birds tell me of the lands they have seen all over Earth. I used to think my tree was my world when I hibernated in its veins but now I wish for adventure, like the birds. I want to see the real world. I know now of places the birds have seen, like the Desertlands full of yellow glitter and Forestlands full of trees like mine and Waterlands full of raging seas and the Greylands full of cement huts taller than trees that can reach up and stab the clouds. The Greylands sound awful. The birds tell me about the ground covered in patches of hard greyness where trees were ripped from their roots to make way for buildings that cast smoke into the air to smother the sun.
The days are millennia. My tree stops telling stories and I feel lonely. The others are ahead of me, I can see I am the last to grow. I will myself to just grow. I am sick of being so small and useless. I do not want the tree to think I am a weakling or it might banish me, and then I will never go to Paradise.
I speak to the insects when they come for tree sap or a place to sleep. The insects are energetic and easily distracted, their conversations are disjointed and never last very long. Spiders decorate me with their delicate webs. I feel eggs being laid snugly around me. The spider trusts me, it knows I will protect her brood from the others while she hunts. Flies sometimes visit me too, and it shocks me when they tell me their lives only last one day. They can only experience one sunrise and sunset, one midnight and midday. I am wasting time by lamenting my youth! I need to enjoy this all while I can, the peace and tranquillity of having no job to do yet. I have summer and autumn to do my job and I know it will kill me. I will dry out, darken and turn crispy. Then I will be too weak to go on, and my tree will release me into Paradise. While I am able I must learn to love the Now.
Great
There is a bud right next to me on my branch. I have never noticed it before. I try to whisper to it through my tree’s veins but it does not respond. It is a late bloomer. I compare myself to it as the days pass, and realise it is growing twice as fast as I am. Every day I speak to the bud but receive no reply. I wonder why the tree has just created it. I tell it the stories I have heard in my time as a bud, to keep it company. In awe, after seven days, I watch as it uncurls itself silently, facing the sun. The next day, so do I.
After working hard with the sun for a few hours, around midday I hear a whisper. It is not familiar, but I listen closely.
I thank you for your stories, Friend. It is the late bloomer. Friend? I realise that must be my name. No one has ever given me a name before. I feel warm, though the sun is not shining today.
Why did you never respond, Great? I decide to call him Great because he is so magnificently big, and grew astonishingly fast. The sun favours him, and he absorbs her energy in great gulps into my tree. I feel the electricity as it passes by me. He must have been able to speak all this time, but chose not to respond. Warmness rushes through me that he has chosen to speak to me now.
I focused all my attention on growing. His vibrations are commanding and deep. He is powerful, I can tell that much from his voice. I have never heard a whisper like it. The others are so faint.
Jealousy filled me when you grew so quickly, though you were days behind me in emerging. I admit.
No, Friend. You grew slowly because you are wise. This is the thickest branch on our tree. Only the best are born here.
Then why am I here? I am small and slow and the sun does not absorb as quickly in me as it does others.
You are the wisest of sun harvesters. Others see and hear the world but they do not understand or appreciate it fully.
Sun harvesters. I did not know we had a name. I like it.
How old are you? I am curious. His presence was never there when I was within my branch.
It is hard to know. I am either as old as our tree or as young as those eggs you watch over.
How can you not know? I can remember my creation after the others had fallen away. It was just before the winter and the cold chill set into our tree. What is your earliest memory?
You, telling me of the beautiful sunrise. It sounded so perfect I had to see it for myself.
Was it what you expected, Great? I want to know if it is just me. Am I really the only one that can appreciate life?
Yes. You de
scribed it beautifully.