Two Trees

I went for a walk. I found a tree with young yellow leaves. I thought about its stillness. I thought about my parents who are fighting again and for whom I've become a go-between again because I'm afraid that if they talk directly with one another they will hurt each other in a physical way -- again. They've been caught in this cycle for years, and I've been caught with them. I want it to end. I'm tired of it all. I'm tired of clinging to hope when my parents have long ago given up on it.

I found another tree. The sun was behind its trunk and it made it glow. The world doesn't seem real sometimes. If you look at it from certain angles it seems like a dream someone is dreaming, one of those in which you find yourself naked in front of a crowd and try to run and can't, and think desperately of ways to cover yourself but there aren't any.