nature writing and the heart of the forest worlds

if there are twelve to twenty one forests, some loosely connected, some not connected at all, then the woodlands can in a way be seen or broadly interpreted as a being, as a living thing. and where then is the heart, the centre of it all? it is not what a surveyor or trail walker might at first think, which might be where a large pond waits at the bottom of a hill. and it might not either be the large northern tract that houses a marsh and indeed seems like something more extraordinary than the rest. or up by long wide fields that live at the purlieu of a connected woodlands,- it’s reeds and strange old tree branches watching all seasons and all things w/in each season. it is rather, at the end of the long walking trail that travels through autumnal leaves yellow and orange, and wild sumac preternaturally red. there are hundreds if not thousands of evergreens different in size, providing shade to the fairytale-like acres below. this is where the heart of the region’s forests is, and it is quiet and confident, healthy and untroubled by the outside world.