I am 'a force' you say? 'A force for good', well that is good. Follow the trails. Happy trails, yes why not? Blaze your own trail and you can come upon giant flowers which if you lie underneath, will bathe you in a cascade of perfumed wax petals. Hot wax during the day once the sun has heated them up. Blazing a trail indeed! Or see if it can lead you to trees, whose canopy modulates the drip of raindrops so that it provides the most piquant of water tortures.
Perhaps you prefer to stand naked beneath pines and let their arrowing needles scarify you. Or stretch out prone on top of those already tumbled as a bed of nails, while conifer cones drop on you from above. Find your way to the gently swaying palm fronds and offer them your bare back for exquisite flaying. Or similar with more spinous briers. Discover gossamer leaves large enough for you to pluck and place over your face like a mask. And feel the fibres deliciously contract.
Go seek out plants to rub up against and coat yourself in their pollen. Sweetly honeyed to draw an army of ants to crawl over your flesh and milk you. Or other plants with so acidic a sap as to blister and skin peel you. Sprouts with vesicles of seed that burst open and blind you temporarily, inducing you to rely on your other senses. I won't even broach the obvious array of berries, currants, fungi and fruits which will derange your mental functions should you opt to ingest them. Yet even brushing unwittingly against certain shoots may release emissions and scents that will unpick your consciousness.
I can guide you to roots which will lash your feet and tendrils which will manacle your hands. They can twist and convolute to have you writhe upon their naturally constituted strapado. Seek out vines that snag your feet and then sweep you up high into the foliage to remain suspended, dangling among the scourging branches. Or stand hard up against creepers which will bind you round the throat and choke you to within an inch of your life. Shrubs with their barbs to pierce your flesh. Conferring a crown of thorns to complete your divine stigmata. Or plenteous giant spiders' webs for you to hang from, being squeezed by your own weight like a silky crucifixion. Or a floral mucilage that will cause you to adhere in so tight an embrace so as to feel like a paralysis of your whole being.
Speaking of which, I further possess trees with knot holes of perfect dimension to wholly contain you and cut off your light and air. To return you to an unforgiving ligneous womb. Truly tree hugging. Outsized Venus fly traps to swallow you up and dissolve you in their sweet digestive tract.
'Why do I offer you all this'? Not because I am 'a voyeur'! How so, when I can see such scenarios played out everyday between the current ecology? What need I of intromitting human life with all its animus, into the present disposition? Ah yes of course. You are desirous of righting the crimes against me. You, my apocalyptic acolytes, apostles, advocates and agitators (apologists?). All on my behalf. Fetishising me. Anthropomorphising my progeny. Well now we fetishise you. Now you are our playthings, in our image. Still credit that I am a force for good?
This story appears in my second flash fiction collection
