'Shrooms

I tread where others fear to take even the most timid of steps
My childish sense of wonder urges me to place one foot in front of the other in an off-kilter cadence
The forest which surrounds me beckons me further to the rise and fall of its peaks and valleys
Leaves flutter like wind-soaked *pages* from the autumn sapped oaks, stoic in their deliberate steadfastness
They crackle like bones beneath my somber feet
I become perplexed by a trail of carpenter ants, carrying the carcass of a cicada on their backs
I'm intrigued by the notion of silently *watching* these tiny creatures, almost as if I was an omnipotent God or alien being
Stopped alongside a grandoise highway of bark and grass to impose my judgement upon these mere mortals
As I look up from my egotistical pipe dream of an anthill, I notice the shadows have grown and distorted, this is not the place from which my mind disembarked
*Moonlight* filters through my once faithfully friendly trees, now contorted and twisted into strangely ominous shapes
I feel the eyes of some creature or demon, be it of my minds creation or of a translucent exaggeration of the darkness, I know not
Whatever it may be, I must find my way to the edge of this wood, as I feel *he's* getting closer
I pull from my pocket a torch, lighting the shrubbery in a cone of luminescence spreading from its lense
I spin and cascade to a stop, my *heartbeat* taming as I come to find
That I never left my yard at all

Only my reality

Written for the "Quick Write.. Can You Keep Up" competition