Where the Earth Knows My Name

I walk where trees remember me—

Not by name,

but by the rhythm of my breath

as it slows beneath their canopies.

The wind does not ask who I am,

it simply wraps around my shoulders

like an old friend

who knows better than to speak.

Beneath my feet, the soil sighs—

a sound I cannot translate

but understand.

It is the welcome I never heard

from concrete walls.

In this quiet,

the world is not outside of me.

It is with me.

It is in me.

It is what I forgot

when I learned to chase clocks instead of clouds.

Once, I thought nature was a place I visited—

a backdrop for photographs,

a break from the real world.

But now I know:

It is the real world.

And I

am the visitor.

A guest among the roots

and rivers

and rhythms that pulse

older than language.

The birds do not care for my resume.

The trees do not ask for credentials.

The ocean has never once

requested my opinions.

And yet—

they accept me.

Without condition.

Without judgment.

Without agenda.

Nature loves me best

when I stop trying to deserve it.

I have buried pain in forest floors.

Let the rain rinse sorrow from my spine.

Spoken my shame to the sky

and heard nothing in return—

but somehow felt healed.

Because the sky does not interrupt.

It listens

the way no human ever has:

without reply,

but with presence.

The river taught me to let go—

watching how it carries

both blossom and branch

without clinging to either.

The mountain showed me stillness.

That to be unmoved

is not the same as being unaware.

That silence

can be full of song.

The wildflower whispered,

“You do not need to bloom for anyone.

You are not here to be admired.

You are here because you are alive.”

I have watched the moon

wax and wane

and never apologize

for not being whole.

And I learned—

maybe I don’t need to be whole either,

to be luminous.

The truth is:

We belong to the earth

long before we belong to any person.

We were held by rivers

before we were held by lovers.

We were nourished by sunlight

before we were praised by bosses.

We were calmed by birdsong

before we ever knew applause.

Nature is not just scenery.

It is a mirror.

It reflects not how we appear—

but who we are

when no one is looking.

When I sit beneath the branches,

I do not perform.

I simply exist.

And that, somehow,

is enough.

The seasons live in my bones.

Spring stirs when I forgive.

Summer blazes when I create.

Autumn exhales when I let go.

Winter rests when I remember:

I do not need to do to be.

We speak of saving nature—

but perhaps

we mean saving ourselves.

For every tree we plant,

we anchor our own breath.

For every stream we protect,

we safeguard the softness in us

that still knows how to feel wonder.

I want to live like the forest:

Rooted and reaching.

Dark in some places,

but full of life.

I want to live like the ocean:

Endlessly moving,

but always whole.

I want to live like the sky:

Changing,

and yet never less vast.

If ever I forget who I am,

I return to the earth—

not to escape the world,

but to remember

the part of me

that is the world.

And when the wind passes through me,

when my breath matches the rhythm of leaves,

when I walk not on the earth

but with it—

I know:

This is the truest version of me.

The one untouched by ambition,

unbent by fear.

The one who does not need to be known—

because here,

among moss and stone,

the earth already knows my name.