knowing knotweed

by joey friedman

in september’s fall equinox glow, the luscious first days of the harvest moon, knotweed is a playground of queer joy. our bodies, dripping with wa ter from the salmon brook, weave through the knotweed canopy growing along the silty shore, the paper thin droplet seeds drape into dapples of summer sunshine like frog eggs swimming in the light.

this is to say, who is to say knotweed doesn’t belong? who knows.

months later, december’s knot weed is a burnt orange ghost forest:

bare, barely recognizable. it belongs in the way that i once cracked its lanky stem with one hand just to show someone i loved its hollow structure, which led to blushing, and laughter.

and now i see that orange ghost forest and think of blushing, and laughter.

it belongs in the way that knotweed can be used to treat long lyme disease. in the way that there is so much around us, always,

that we do not understand yet, and there is so much love around us that we do not feel yet.

all i know is now, now more than ever we must be so, so careful as a spindle-legged spider spinning delicate webs, catching drops of foamy river spray, careful about othering, about assigning worth to beings who are just living, as beings do. eating and growing and grieving and leaving dishes dirty in the sink and loving and no plant, no human is ever invasive or alien or other, they are just living, as beings do.

this is to say, who is to say knotweed doesn’t belong? who knows.

all i know how to do is walk in the woods and bend my body

into the shapes of the trees i see around me in a dance of impossibly gnarled roots. i don’t understand much oth er than this: if you breathe in, just as a gust of wind blows, you breathe in wind and then you’re a little bit made of wind, wind and water and i read you could be bits of what has been or may be come a hummingbird, or a rat, or maybe one of those red and black bugs crawling all around burlington. this is all to say, who knows? H

art by joey friedman