The Land of the Giants

By Peter Bowden

He stood at the base of the ancient tree, neck craned, eyes following the twisted rise of bark and shadow into the sky. The roots were buried deep—older than memory, older maybe than names. Its trunk flared like something forged rather than grown, each groove a scar, a story, a century’s sigh. He touched it with the palm of his hand, rough skin to rough skin, and something in him stilled.

The wind moved softly through the high branches, stirring the hanging moss like old lace in a forgotten attic. The tree breathed, or so it seemed, exhaling a silence that was not empty but full—of birds long flown, rainstorms long passed, and voices that once whispered beneath its limbs. In the hush, he imagined all the things this tree had seen. Lovers. Soldiers. Children laughing barefoot. People like him, who came searching for something they could not name.

He did not speak. Words felt too sharp, too fast for this place. Instead, he listened. To the groan of the bark. To the small rustle of the world still turning. And as he stood there, still as a statue and somehow smaller than he had ever been, he felt it—the weight of time not as a burden, but as a gift. And he let it press against his chest like a gentle hand.


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