We are lost. Can we ever be found? And who exactly is looking for us?

I think of the poem, ‘Lost’, by David Wagoner.

“Stand still. The trees ahead and bushes beside you
Are not lost. Wherever you are is called Here,
And you must treat it as a powerful stranger,
Must ask permission to know it and be known.
The forest breathes. Listen. It answers,
I have made this place around you.
If you leave it, you may come back again, saying Here.
No two trees are the same to Raven.
No two branches are the same to Wren.
If what a tree or a bush does is lost on you,
You are surely lost. Stand still. The forest knows
Where you are. You must let it find you.”
One line in particular stands out for me:
‘If what a tree or a bush does is lost on you,
You are surely lost.’

I wonder, in a poem filled with such hope,
Why he chose to add that one particular line.

There is hope.
There is hope.
Unless you can’t see the connection between
You and all living things.
Then, you’re surely lost.

Arguably, some judgment there, even if it’s true
In my story, in your story;
Just not the stories
Of so many who cannot see the connection to
Other. Living. Beings. except to exploit them, or
Abandon them in hurricanes and floods;
Except to hunt them, even if they are the
Last. Of. Their. Kind.

And not only other species.
Our. Own. Species.
We are exploited by each other
and may already be the last of our kind, too.

And there is hope in the poem.
“Stand still. The forest knows
Where you are. You must let it find you.”

A beautiful expression that nature will always forgive us
And welcome us back. If only we’d just stand still for a moment.

Stand. Still.

The last line in the title of this article, “We are lost. Can we ever be found?” asks, “And who exactly is looking for us?”

Now, there’s a question.

I believe we are looking for us.
Each of us is looking for ourselves,
And we are looking for each other.

In order to do that, we need to
Let. Down. Our. Guard.

Stop trying to be so damn perfect,
So damn successful, so damn powerful,
So damn rich and impenetrable
In a world that is fragile at best.

Every day, we die just a little.
Some days, we die completely.

Stand still.
Let yourself be found.
Please, let yourself be found.
​
- Linda Lombardo 9.23.18

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