A Vision Quest in Verse
This article shares an excerpt from a feature called Written by the Wild showcasing Chloé Dyson’s poetry: one that was inspired by participating in
a vision quest with us in 2023.
She was longlisted for the Wild Muse Writing prize in 2024, two years prior to her parting from this world. I miss her mischievous laughter and friendship, her unbridled passion and dedication to this way of courting nature.
Excerpt:These paired poems – one written after four hours alone in nature, the other after four days – carry the imprint of stillness, of listening, and of courage.
Chloé writes with clarity and awe, tracking her own transformation
in communion with wild land.
There is reverence here, but also a quiet power: a reclaiming of voice, of belonging, of truth.
These are poems to return to when you need reminding of what it means to stand on the edge of the known – and to step across.
What inspired you to write your piece, and how did you approach capturing the interplay between the human experience and the natural world in your narrative?
I was inspired to write Sometimes a Lion Heart after going on my first vision quest or wilderness rite of passage in Dartmoor, where I spent four days and four nights alone with the more-than-human world.
It was such an incredible experience, it reopened my senses and brought my back to myself - back into my body and the body of the earth - like nothing else has.
On the night before we went out to the land, we sat on ancient rocks overlooking the moors and my guide, Natasha Lythgoe from The Art of Rewilding read Sometimes a Wild God by Tom Hirons. Only she did it with a twist: she turned the god into a goddess.
I knew the poem and loved it, so when she spoke the words “Sometimes a Wild Goddess”, it came alive in me in a completely new way.
It travelled with me for the four days and nights, and after journalling about my experience, I ran with a prompt turning it into a metrical emulation of the original poem. It was my way of staying with the experience for longer and helping me process what happened.
Sometimes a Lion Heart
~ A metrical emulation of Sometimes a Wild God by Tom Hirons. And a dedication to the lionesses who walked beside me on my wilderness quest led by Natasha Lythgoe; the lion who protects; and, the good man who untied my knot.
For the afraid ones.
Sometimes a lion heart goes to the woods.
She is afraid and does not know the ways
Of wilderness, of tick and nettle and soil.
Her roar makes little, if any, sound.
When the lion heart arrives at the trees,
You won't recognise her.
She reminds you of someone lost
That you might have known,
Or the re-membering you haven't seen enough.
She can't prowl in long grass—yet;
Instead, she sits on a rock
Absorbing millennia through the moss,
Though wood sorrel binds
Her core to the earth.
You want to invite her back.
You are welcoming.
It is dusk, or dawn, and still, upclose…
You look straight to her soul
Because you feel yourself alive there.
Your wren calls;
The lion heart sighs.
She holds her anguish and
The trees hear her voice,
Then take her deeper.
The lion heart stands in your grove.
Bracken is up to her waist;
Epiphytes carpet her wooded surroundings
And foxgloves announce themselves
Gathering in the North—tall like friends.
“If only you knew,” you say
“The strength of your….”
She lies on the ground, crying.
Bare feet touching oak.
There are spiders in her blood.
When the clouds pick up,
You bring her back and
Tell her it's fine.
You will not let her drift
From the medicine she seeks.
The lion heart asks for clarity
And you listen to the wind,
Then warm the breeze for her.
A deer is beginning to run
In her night bones. You breathe.
‘Oh, limitless space.
Oh, eternal mystery.
Oh, endless cycles of death and (re)birth.
Oh, miracle of life.
Oh, the wondrous dance of it all.’
You breathe again.
She sleeps soundly in your arms
Tucked between Hazelwood
And Ivy-oaks, wondering how
You got to be so terrifying.
The lion heart tends to ancient stones
In the stream, clearing stuck debris.
She pulls out a rancid stick,
Holds her chest tightly
‘And all the birds begin to sing.’
A squirrel jumps into her belly.
Butterflies court the nightsky.
The spiders rush through her blood.
Your deer leap, and above
Clouds part and tell stories at once.
The lion heart growls with your wren.
You call to the ravens.
A honey buzzard swoops by
His white-feathered flash—a sign of surrender.
A moth dances on a blade of grass.
In broad daylight, the bones of ancestors break
cycles of pain in dried out acreage.
Releasing songdreams of time-forgotten lands.
The tree's heart beats and the gray rock speaks
Of electricity and nakedness.
At the height of the vigil,
There is a spider's nest in the sky.
Two people climb into a tree and—
She keeps seeing a man's face in the leaves.
A shooting star lands.
The lion heart lies by your side.
You are hurting deeply.
You have been hurting for a long time,
Possibly since we separated.
There is a lion's roar deep down.
“Why did you stop protecting me?”
You ask the lion heart and she says:
“I was trying to escape.
The fear took over—
I stopped feeling—I'm sorry.”
‘Listen to them:’
The trees in your feet and
The spiders in your legs and
The deer and the buzzard and the wren…
All of nature's wild beings
In your blood and your bones and your wild.
There is a wellspring of longing.
A roaring of aliveness.
The lion heart bows her head and
Kisses your earth. Bare feet on oak,
And cobwebs between her toes.
Your wren is quiet in the trees.
The dawn is stirring in the East.
Her eyes are clear with brilliance;
Her body shakes from hunger or desire.
There is a loud roar in her belly.
Sometimes a lion heart goes to the woods.
She is no longer afraid of the ways
Of wilderness, of tick and nettle and soil.
Her roar makes more and more sound.
And brings nature into life.