Give Him a Mask and He Will Tell You the Truth

It's a peculiar feature of trees,
Unknown to other sorts of beings,
That they rustle together to name
The things that they believe are not them,

Including their own outstretched shadows,
The arboreal academy
Of secondary existences
That are cast to the ground as their dreams,

Tertiary phosphorescences
That carry the weight of narration,
Which is nothing and massive as night,
Full of the long breezes rippling leaves.

The shadows that inhabit these woods
Probably glow no less than others,
A little more diffusely than stars,
A little less brightly than the moon,

Enough to cast shadows of their own,
To which they give names like Wanderer
And Hermit, Confusion and Thunder,
Irrelevance, Forgiveness, and Storm.

I am, whispers one, not of this world.
I do not belong to these echoes,
Another replies. I am myself,
Alone, the many sing together.