the hollow tree

The Hollow Tree was the perfect fort—the kind that every kid hopes and knows exists somewhere, someplace, hidden in the woods behind some other kid’s house. And there it was, a quarter-mile deep into Kendra’s woods, a fantastic, magical living thing stretching branches and branches beyond the surrounding treetops. Its upper boughs had for years lain bare of the long-ago leaves that once appeared and turned and fell with the seasons. But no one could doubt the life of the thing. Could question that a living, breathing creature stood before them when they came upon it. The base and bottom third of its trunk formed a hollowed out shell. An empty space. A space waiting to be filled, to envelop, to hold. To contain kids and their whispers and secrets.


“The Tao is an empty vessel; it is used but never filled.”
—Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching