Fast Will Fade That Solemn Splendor Of Decline

There's something endlessly marvelous about woods with their tall, reaching trees; even these tamed ones near my home delight me. They might still hide deer in their shadowy depths until dusk, but the trees are as domesticated as a lap dog--the wilderness has largely been driven out of them. Still, I delight in driving through them on quiet nights as my headlights cast an eerie glow on craggy trunks and grasping branches, making them appear more sinister and feral. I prefer the forests of the northwest with their creeping moss and enveloping canopy above, but every thickly grown forest still holds some bit of mystery. As a child I always used to imagine a dozen impossible things I couldn't see existing past the treeline. I suppose I've not quite grown out of believing there is more beyond my limited eyesight.