Why I Exist

My mind remembers woods that glisten white.
They sing to me the calls of wild far lands,
where I begin to feel my soul ignite,
and I can sense my life’s short length expand.

I wish from now and ever on henceforth,
that I, in this my new-found birth, pursue
to be among the oaks and pines far north,
forever free, reliving birth anew.

But time, right now, becomes a vengeful wraith,
and walls conspire to keep me here by might,
to live in agony, while fails my faith
of chance to once again walk in sunlight.

Yet now my mind recalls why I exist:
to live, to live, in woods my soul persists.

Eric C. Schulz