My Silence and Sapling Time, and: Sunflower

This poem is taken from an ongoing manuscript that began in Aokigahara, Japan’s “suicide forest” located near the base of Mt. Fuji. In the manuscript, two parallel sequences intertwine where in one the suicides, the new and old ghosts, the park rangers, and the forest itself are all given voice. In the other, the poems take on an autobiographical exploration thrown against the ecological backdrops of forest and desert, dovetailing thematically as they both simultaneously attempt to map this new geography that the pieces inhabit.

This poem is taken from an ongoing manuscript that began in Aokigahara, Japan’s “suicide forest” located near the base of Mt. Fuji. In the manuscript, two parallel sequences intertwine where in one the suicides, the new and old ghosts, the park rangers, and the forest itself are all given voice. In the other, the poems take on an autobiographical exploration thrown against the ecological backdrops of forest and desert, dovetailing thematically as they both simultaneously attempt to map this new geography that the pieces inhabit.