On my way down I always stop here. A drink, check the time, maybe a date bar. But “here” has always been a lovely large, mossy beech daringly reaching out over the abyss.
Now the beech is in the abyss. It must have departed in a big way. Looking down the gully, I make it out almost at the river’s edge.
This one didn’t go out with a whimper. No one was around to hear, unless the stag whose tracks mark up this path was in the neighborhood. No one knew.
Except the beech. It will have known the bang, the crackle and the crash. As it will now know years of decay in an unaccustomed position. Beetles and funghi are already at work, effecting the return.
