I grew up in this forest and I knew These giant trees when they were nothing more than Than slender saplings swaying in the wind; Sought solitude, delighted in the lore Of nature, who became my teacher first; Walked down trails where sun and shadow meet, Through silence softly tucked about the days; Traced the twists and turns of every creek. Stepping lightly through the after-glow, Amid the falling flakes of silver white, Belonging to the moment and the mood, Another little creature of the night, With quickened breath, ears attuned, who stood ... Sensing God within this winter wood!
My daughter, three years old and fearless, loves nothing more than wading along the shallow shoreline outside our house. Holding hands, we walk barefoot upstream quietly in the water, stepping delicately over stones. Besides the water sounds, there is just immense silence. We stop and listen to the water. She asked me for a story; I did not have one. Listening, she turned in delight and announced, "Daddy, this water is talking." In listening to the river a kind of silence prevails, broken only by the rush of water over rocks. Such a silence is more like faint echoes, each a series of dim reverberations. They continue in you, distant yet familiar.
