As you wander about the forest, where the river runs nearby, you might see them here and there, now and then, not often, and mostly you would pass them by unseen.
Unless you are wandering for that express purpose, wanting to find some source of help for your troubled heart, some sign you are not alone, some respite from the pain of what wasn’t supposed to have happened, but did.
A heart-shaped stone along the river bank.
A cloud formation that resembles your feelings.
A romantic symbol of love – as you picture it anyway – in the bark of a tree, begun perhaps by a woodpecker and then widened and deepened maybe by a squirrel, either solo or having combined their efforts to whittle away, wounding, scarring, damaging the tree’s wherewithal to heal before infection occurs, it’s very survival sometimes threatened.
Though incredibly resilient and adaptably resistant to injuries suffered throughout their lives, trees are nevertheless susceptible to wounds, their structural stability even at risk.
Emblematic of human life and love and loss are the vulnerabilities of a tree.
As wounds can be to a tree, heartbreak can be to those who grieve.
Pests are drawn to a tree when it is in distress, its tissues damaged, its cell structure exposed.
Pain, likewise, can carve out a heart-shaped hole within the one who suffers, irretrievably, the loss of a loved one.
Healing, however, is possible.
Though the scar will forever remain, “wound wood” is the natural attempt of a tree to close wounds by sealing the affected area in which the speed of recuperation is greatly impacted by the damaged tree’s environment.
Even so is the so-vitally-important environment for those damaged by grief, their hearts exposed.
It takes someone who understands, who has likely born their own grief – and will forever bear the scars – to come alongside and love the heartbroken back to health.
