I look to the mountains

O Lord,
I look to the mountains
and know where my help comes from
Your majesty astounds me
compels me
and draws me near
For the hills sing of your steadfastness
and the rocks your faithfulness
and the water your joy

what hope have I greater than the hope I find in you?
What strength have I bolder than the strength I have in your arms?
What love have I deeper than what you have given me?
O Lord, what have I but you?

"Visitors" from Thoreau's Walden

"One inconvenience I sometimes experience in so small a house, the difficulty of getting to a sufficient distance from my guest when we begin to utter the big thoughts in big words. You want room for your thoughts to get into sailing trim and run a course or two before they make their port. The bullet of your thought must have overcome its lateral and ricochet motion and fallen into its last and steady course before it reaches the ear of the hearer, else it may plough out again through the side of his head. Also, our sentences want room to unfold and form their columns in the interval. Individuals, like nations, must have suitable broad and natural boundaries, even a considerable neutral ground, between them. I have found it a singular luxery to talk across my pond to a companion on the opposite side. In my house we were so near that we could not begin to hear, we could not speak low enough to be heard; as when you throw two stones into calm water so near that they break each other's undulations." (pg. 137-138)


The difficulty I find in conversation is how the distance between two people is ofen not large enough for the size of their heads. The smaller the room, the more likely they are to bump into one another. Like two babes in the womb, they grow untill you cannot converse with or even view your companion. Only be way of circling through the ambiotic fluid, may the message reach the listner's ear. It is most likely to be swallowed up in the darkness which exists between two people.

To truly listen, we must stand at a distance relative to the intensity of our words. I have repeatedly discovered the futility of having crucial discussions with your parents face to face. It is much easier accomplished over the phone. People need room to breath. It is a happy occasion when you find someone whose thoughts overlap with your own, so your ripples not only meet, but understand one another.

each and every one

Can one experience nature without ever hearing it?
Sitting on Dexter lawn blasting my IPOD,
I can smell nature.
The grass has a bitersweet scent
and the tree I lean against smells of wisdom lost long ago.

I can touch nature.
The bark is coarse like crocodile skin
while plants leaves are so soft they slip though my fingers.

I can taste it.
Although I wouldn't recommend nibling on chips of redwood
or downing blades of grass-unless you want to cause yourself to throw up!

I can see nature.
It's all around me.
The spectrum of color is so wide my eye happily bounces from one plant to the next.
Purple Grey Red Brown Black and Green tying everything together,
as if some Master Painter intended it that way.

As shadows dance upon my page,
I wonder how I thought sound was essential to experience
this lifeforce.
Afterall, it speaks to each
and every one of our senses.

Visitors

Thoreau's observations on speech begin to reach an understanding which questions not only hte purpose of our words, but the force of them. What does it take to be able to listen well?..to communicate well? In the end, is it all a loss? Such intimacy is expressed in words! We are so often frightened by them and desire to be far enough away to turn and run. In Walden, speech is described as bullets which once in flight may miss the ears of the intended. How can words have the potential for so much power and be rendered useless? If I was to execute all conversation as I intended to, what a different life this would be!

How

How can I be so close and yet so far
from what speaks to me most?

The chirping of birds is drowned out
by the hum of buses and the sliding of tires against asphalt.

I am enveloped by pine, oak, and earth,
yet it is unable to soak beneath my skin.
I cannot breathe the air of both nature and civilization at once.
Instead, I find myself gasping for breath,
hoping to cling to one world or the other.

so many languages

Chirp Chirp
Tweet
Kaca Kaca Kaca
bzzzzzzzzz
Ribit
I've never heard quite so many languages at once

Do they understand one another?
Do the birds responds to the chirps of the cricket?
are the frogs inspired by the ravens?
Who orchestrated this symphony?

I certainly didn't need a ticket to attend.
It didn't even have to be scheduled on my calender.

This music found me.
It's chorus seems to steadily repeat,

"Listen,
Put your heart at rest.
You are one of us!"

Beginnings

Why is it so impossible to begin?

To begin to
love
cry
listen
speak
or comprehend.

I've begun to realize that I like being stuck exactly where I was yesterday. It's easier that way. No challenge, change or frustration to face. No mountains to climb or valleys to forge. Yet, this song, this aria within me cries desperatly to be heard. When I reaxamine my heart I cannot keep my voice from singing. For the song has already begun.