Am I guilty of
violent sacrilege
crushing the sand under my
tourist sports shoes
stepping on the serpent-like roots
sinewy snaking smooth
and the moss, the moss,
the green shroud of timelessness
that covers
canopy and floor,
roots and trunks,
rocks and anthills
and the hundreds of
dolmens and menhirs
fallen or standing
but inviolate
in this Mawphlang,
this sacred grove?

Am I violating
a solemn vow
breathing of its air
thick and sweet
and delicately scented
by a thousand ferns and shrubs
and rhododendron and rudraksh trees?
When I even take a breath
am I ripping a silken silence
that only crickets and hornbills
are permitted to weave?

What is that strange call
that brings me here
among these mossy stones
from a time that now
I seem to remember?
Dejà vu? I ask myself
And the whispered rustles of a
windless motionless grove
reply

I have come home.
Tonight, I'll play with my folks
in the grassy grounds outside
where no tree grows,
where men may walk.

I have not transgressed.
I have merely crossed
the bridge of time.