I dream of the forest that night.

I am there even less than I was last time. The forest melts into the black nothing of sleep before creeping back into existence a leaf and a branch at a time. In this fashion, it appears and reappears countless times.

When it is there -- when I am there -- I walk. Where to, I know not. The forest passes in an indistinct haze of shadow and barely illuminated undergrowth. Even if I knew my destination, I could not distinguish any one footstep from another.

I call out. Of course, there is no answer. I am not here enough to have lungs or vocal chords, to refashion the air of this place into something that could be heard.

That doesn’t stop me from trying.

Formless, voiceless, I call, ceaselessly, for you.