The Forest Watches

When I was younger, we lived on the edge of a small forest, complete with swamps, lady slippers, and Wampanoag folklore. My siblings and I would spend so much time outside amongst the trees, that I began to know every root clump or raspberry patch there was. One morning, I started my day following the paths and felt something watching me. I looked up and saw a sculpted face staring back. Because it was made of out the same bark as the tree, it was perfectly camouflaged. It took me several weeks to figure out the brothers had placed these, and not the spirits of the forest. Those few weeks produced more stories and scenarios involving these omnipresent tree spirits than I could remember. I'm now trying to bring those stories alive once again.