Between Bruises & Blooms

The forest has always known
what to do with wounded things.

It does not ask
why they bite.

It does not flinch
when they bare their teeth
at an open hand.

It knows
that sometimes fear
wears claws.

Tonight,
Black Briar Forest
left something at my door.

A little creature
made of thorns
and trembling,

eyes wide
with every reason
not to trust me.

She hissed.

She struck.

She warned me
in the only language
the wild had taught her—

do not touch me.

So I didn’t ask her
to be gentle.

I only gave her
somewhere safe
to be afraid.

And slowly,

the thorns loosened.

The growl disappeared
somewhere beneath
a blanket.

Her body stopped preparing
for a war
that wasn’t coming.

Then somehow—

this tiny piece
of wilderness,

this little storm
with fur,

climbed into my lap
and stayed.

As if the forest
had whispered to her,

you can rest here.

As if every briar
eventually learns
there are hands
that do not come
to tear it from the earth.

Maybe I didn’t name her
after the forest.

Maybe the forest
named her first.

And tonight,

it brought her home.

Briar.

Thorns and all.