BE NOT AFRAID

She fled the forest
but the forest followed her.

It crept up
behind her then

loomed up ahead
like a Grimm's tale

that nobody and everybody
had heard.

Don't step off the path
but the path had forgotten

itself ages ago
the directions too had

gotten lost somehow
it would appear.

To go back now as scary
as to keep going on.

She was lost
to herself

"Be not afraid!" she quoted
scripture to herself that

she hadn't thought
she had known.

The howl of a wolf somewhere
around the next bend.